A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Team Wellington will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Walter Scott and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Steven Lustica 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.
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.
In brief
The dugoutJake Bell asks for a word with the manager
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Steven Lustica was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 1‑2, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Kosta Lewis and Team Wellington agree another 3 years.
Nobody at Team Wellington 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.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Team Wellington have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Team Wellington can pretend not to have heard.
Walter Scott 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 thought about how hard another man trains, and Steven Lustica was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
He is 19 and the ground already sings his name, which is a thing that happens to local boys and almost never to signings. Everything from here is measured against an affection he did nothing to earn except be from here.
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at Canterbury United is saying, and nobody at Team Wellington is enjoying the guessing.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Clayton Payne has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Jake Bell is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Michael Bell has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Kosta Lewis is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
He is doing things every Saturday that nobody around him can answer. It is flattering for a season and a problem after that, and Team Wellington know which stage they are at.