Marked for Peter Lienhart
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market23 Apr 2029
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Stjarnan they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad23 Apr 2029
A falling-out at Stjarnan
Emil Atlason and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad23 Apr 2029
Birnir Snær Ingason 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.
The dugout23 Apr 2029
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
Squad23 Apr 2029
“I did not sign to watch. Nobody does.” The oldest complaint in the game, and Stjarnan will have to answer it with minutes or with a move.
The dugout23 Apr 2029
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Jóhann Árni Gunnarsson is on it.
Market23 Apr 2029
The Emil Atlason story refuses to die
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Emil Atlason signs something — a contract at Stjarnan or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Match23 Apr 2029
Continental football is in reach for Stjarnan
39 points from position 4. The title is somebody else’s business and the drop is somebody else’s problem; what is left is the argument about passports.
The dugout23 Apr 2029
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Strahinja Djuricic trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad26 Feb 2029
A fracture rules Ronan Curtis out for 70 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Stjarnan will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Market26 Feb 2029
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Stjarnan people have started saying his name in the past tense.
Market26 Feb 2029
The phone has started ringing about Alpha Conteh again, and this time the name on the line is Keflavik. Stjarnan are listening politely and promising nothing.
Market26 Feb 2029
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Darri Bergmann Gylfason will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Stjarnan the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad26 Feb 2029
A falling-out at Stjarnan
Emil Atlason and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad26 Feb 2029
Words at Stjarnan training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Birnir Snær Ingason 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.
Market26 Feb 2029
“They were honest with me, and I would rather know.” Andri Rúnar Bjarnason has been informed he is not in the manager's thinking at Stjarnan.
Squad26 Feb 2029
The system has changed and his position has not. A footballer can improve his form; he cannot improve the manager’s formation, and that is the whole of the problem.
The dugout26 Feb 2029
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Jóhann Árni Gunnarsson is on it.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad19 Feb 2029
A fracture rules Ronan Curtis out for 77 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Stjarnan will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Market19 Feb 2029
IA come back empty-handed
The bid was some way short and Stjarnan did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Market19 Feb 2029
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
Squad19 Feb 2029
Emil Atlason in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Stjarnan this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Transfer targets19 Feb 2029
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Fjolnir have kept their man, and Stjarnan go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Squad19 Feb 2029
Birnir Snær Ingason 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.
The dugout19 Feb 2029
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
Market19 Feb 2029
Peter Lienhart is 19, and Stjarnan have signed him for the player he will be rather than the one he is. The first team can wait; the point of a deal like this is the years it buys.
Squad19 Feb 2029
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Peter Lienhart commits to Stjarnan for another 3 years.