Marked for Bartosz Kuśmierczyk
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad20 Mar 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Lillestrom this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad20 Mar 2028
Words at Lillestrom training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Nemanja Radoja is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Squad20 Mar 2028
Gustav Nyheim asks for a word with the manager
“I would rather say it to his face than read about it.” The meeting was requested by the player, which tells you most of what you need to know.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Match13 Mar 2028
Lillestrom are in real trouble now
Position 14, 30 points, and a fixture list with fewer games left in it than excuses. The arithmetic is not cruel yet, but it has stopped being kind.
Market13 Mar 2028
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Lillestrom, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad13 Mar 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Lillestrom this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad13 Mar 2028
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Bartosz Kuśmierczyk is living that version at Lillestrom, and it tends to show in the first month.
Squad13 Mar 2028
Nemanja Radoja falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Squad13 Mar 2028
5 new faces, and Lillestrom are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad7 Feb 2028
Benjamin Mendy damages knee ligaments — 38 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 38 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Squad7 Feb 2028
Tempers go at Pogon
Valentin Cojocaru was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Match5 Feb 2028
8 goals as Pogon and Lech go for it
Defending was optional and nobody took up the option. 8 goals between Pogon and Lech, and not one of the people who paid to be there will ask for the money back.
Squad7 Feb 2028
Words at Pogon training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Prince Adu Kwabena is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Squad7 Feb 2028
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Éder Balanta, and the manager let it.
Player ratings7 Feb 2028
A performance of 8.80 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
Player ratings7 Feb 2028
Marked 8.59 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
Match5 Feb 2028
Honours even between Pogon and Lech
4‑4, and both dressing rooms will call it two points lost. A draw that asked plenty of questions and answered none of them.
Loan watch7 Feb 2028
27 starts now, an average of 6.64, and the team sheet at Piast has stopped being a question. Exactly what everybody signed up for.