Marked for Bill Sutton
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad2 Aug 2027
A knee injury of the worst kind for Adoum Defallah
89 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Elect Sport lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Squad2 Aug 2027
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 53 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Boardroom2 Aug 2027
The Elect Sport board want somebody sold
The instruction has come from upstairs rather than from the dugout, which is the version of this conversation no manager enjoys. Somebody in that squad is now available whether the man who picks the team thinks so or not.
Squad2 Aug 2027
Frédéric Djoeta 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.
Squad2 Aug 2027
“The easiest signature of my career.” Bill Sutton and Elect Sport agree another 2 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Boardroom2 Aug 2027
Elect Sport release $4.0K for the manager
The board have put money on the table rather than an encouraging word. What happens to it now is somebody else's problem, and somebody else's job.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad19 Jul 2027
A knee injury of the worst kind for Adoum Defallah
103 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Elect Sport lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Squad19 Jul 2027
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 67 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Match19 Jul 2027
Elect Sport are in among the leaders
Position 1 and 41 points on the board. Nobody at the ground will say the word out loud yet, and everybody at the ground is thinking it.
Market19 Jul 2027
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Elect Sport is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Boardroom19 Jul 2027
There is no worse way to lose a footballer. Restu Akbar has pre-agreed a move away, which means every appearance between now and June is made by a man the club can no longer sell, and somebody upstairs will be asked why the contract was allowed to get here.
Squad19 Jul 2027
Words at Elect Sport training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Ferdinand Gassina 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.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad7 Jun 2027
Words at Elect Sport training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Ferdinand Gassina 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 Jun 2027
Bill Sutton 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.
Squad7 Jun 2027
“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.
Squad7 Jun 2027
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
Market7 Jun 2027
9 months to run and not a word offered. A club that lets the calendar negotiate for it usually ends up losing to the calendar.
Market7 Jun 2027
The clock does Idan Vered’s negotiating for him
6 months left, and both sides know what that means: every week without a signature, the fee Elect Sport could ask drops and the wages Idan Vered can ask rise.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match24 May 2027
Elect Sport are in among the leaders
Position 1 and 41 points on the board. Nobody at the ground will say the word out loud yet, and everybody at the ground is thinking it.
Squad24 May 2027
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Elect Sport may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Squad24 May 2027
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Elect Sport this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad24 May 2027
Words at Elect Sport training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Ferdinand Gassina 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.
Squad24 May 2027
32 days, the scan says, and scans are kinder than reality. The fixtures in that window have just become somebody else’s job.
Market24 May 2027
3 months left and the two sides are nowhere near each other. Every week this drags on takes money off what Elect Sport could get for him.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad17 May 2027
Ferdinand Gassina 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.
Squad17 May 2027
Danil Baklanov 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.
Squad17 May 2027
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and Elect Sport know it.
Squad17 May 2027
Bill Sutton wants to finish where he started
Every long career reaches the week the player starts thinking about the last one. He would like it to be at the club that first put him on a pitch, and Elect Sport now know that too.
Boardroom17 May 2027
88% of the income goes out in wages at Elect Sport
Every club in football pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time somebody has tried it.
Market17 May 2027
Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Gérard Nodjiram’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match26 Apr 2027
41 points on the board and a place in the leading group. Nobody at the ground is saying the word out loud yet.
Squad26 Apr 2027
“I was told what my role would be, and I signed on that basis. It has not happened.” A grievance with a date attached is the hardest kind to settle.
Squad26 Apr 2027
Words at Elect Sport training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Ferdinand Gassina 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.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad19 Apr 2027
Frédéric Djoeta 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.
Boardroom19 Apr 2027
85% of the income goes out in wages at Elect Sport
Every club in football pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time somebody has tried it.
Squad19 Apr 2027
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad5 Apr 2027
A knee injury of the worst kind for Adoum Defallah
15 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Elect Sport lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Squad5 Apr 2027
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Elect Sport this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad5 Apr 2027
Words at Elect Sport training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Ferdinand Gassina 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.
Squad5 Apr 2027
A place in the month's best eleven for Frédéric Djoita
Four or five weekends of consistency, judged against everybody in the division doing his job. Frédéric Djoita has come out of that comparison in the side, and Elect Sport have had the benefit of every one of those afternoons.
Market5 Apr 2027
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Frédéric Djoeta signs something — a contract at Elect Sport or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Market5 Apr 2027
11 months to run and not a word offered. A club that lets the calendar negotiate for it usually ends up losing to the calendar.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad22 Mar 2027
A knee injury of the worst kind for Adoum Defallah
29 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Elect Sport lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Squad22 Mar 2027
Danil Baklanov: that is not what I was promised
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Elect Sport have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Player ratings22 Mar 2027
Age has not caught Idan Vered yet — 7.98
At 37 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 7.98 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Match20 Mar 2027
Whatever happens, Elect Sport do not lose
7 games unbeaten now. Some were earned and some were survived, but a habit is forming — and habits are the hardest thing in football to play against.
Player ratings22 Mar 2027
Successful dribbles: 22. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad22 Mar 2027
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Elect Sport this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad22 Mar 2027
Words at Elect Sport training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Frédéric Djoita 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.
Player ratings22 Mar 2027
Ninety minutes of Mahamat Tchari at his very best
Marked 8.82. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Elect Sport.
Match20 Mar 2027
Elect Sport hit back inside 2 minutes
Gazelle held the lead for 2 minutes, which is not long enough to enjoy it. Elect Sport answered before the celebration had properly finished, and the shape of the afternoon changed with it.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Market15 Mar 2027
“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.
Squad15 Mar 2027
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Southern United this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad15 Mar 2027
Owen Lewis 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.
Squad15 Mar 2027
Alex Waine has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at Southern United 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.
Squad15 Mar 2027
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
Market15 Mar 2027
Alex Reid leaves for nothing
Contract settled, hands shaken, no fee changing hands. Alex Reid leaves Southern United the quiet way, and the wage bill breathes a little easier.