73 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. PSIM lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Mohamed Moussa Koïta 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.
Jens Raven 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.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. PSIM know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
115 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. PSIM lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Mohamed Moussa Koïta 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.
Franco Ramos Mingo 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Mohamed Moussa Koïta 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.
Nobody at PSIM will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
Franco Ramos Mingo 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.
21 defensive actions and a clean sheet at the end of them. A defender's afternoon can only be told by what did not happen, which is why nobody makes a highlights package out of one and every manager in the division would take it.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Mohamed Moussa Koïta 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.
At 23 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
Marked 8.18 — 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.
It has stopped being a mood in the stands and started being something organised. Boards can ignore a bad atmosphere for a long time; they cannot ignore this stage of it for very long at all.
0‑3 against Siah Jamegan, and no complaints that would survive the replay. The manager spoke about character afterwards; the terraces used shorter words.
“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 Naft Tehran, and it is not being withdrawn.
The rules permit it and it stings anyway. Ehsan Hajsafi has agreed terms with Siah Jamegan for the summer, and until then he pulls on this shirt as a player who has already chosen his next one.
Mojtaba Moghtadaei 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.
Squad29 Jan 2029
Words at Naft Tehran training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Aref Gholami 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.
The run now stands at 16, and the questions being asked around Naft Tehran are no longer polite ones.
The terraces11 Sep 2028
The mood at Naft Tehran has turned into something else
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
Tractor go through and Naft Tehran go home, 0‑1 the scoreline that did it. The dressing room will call the league the priority now, because that is what dressing rooms say.
Adib Zarei 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.
Squad11 Sep 2028
Words at Naft Tehran training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Siaka Sidibé 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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Naft Tehran can pretend not to have heard.
Fáider Burbano 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.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 23 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
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.
The mood at Naft Tehran has turned into something else
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Naft Tehran have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Naft Tehran this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 20 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
Careers are supposed to plateau and then decline, and the players who ignore that are always the ones who were listening on the training ground. 4 points of it, over months, at an age where the direction normally only goes one way.
The paperwork is done long before the player is. Mohammad Azmoun has agreed terms to come here when his current deal runs out, which means Naft Tehran have spent a summer's transfer budget on a phone call.
The mood at Naft Tehran has turned into something else
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
46 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Naft Tehran lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 22 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Naft Tehran is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Careers are supposed to plateau and then decline, and the players who ignore that are always the ones who were listening on the training ground. 3 points of it, over months, at an age where the direction normally only goes one way.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 20 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
Fáider Burbano 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.
A player who expected to start watched it instead. The manager will call it a decision for the team; Gonzalo Bueno will call it something else in private.
The shape wanted a different profile against this opponent, which is a real football answer and no comfort at all to the man it is about. He did nothing wrong and he did not play.
Naft Tehran spent the window trying to move Gonzalo Bueno on and nobody came. He trains with a squad that has already told him he is not part of it, and both sides now wait for the next one.
The mood at Naft Tehran has turned into something else
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Naft Tehran have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Javad Zergani did not need any: 7.61, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Fáider Burbano 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.
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.