Marked for Richard Garayev
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market8 Jul 2030
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Floriana can pretend not to have heard.
Market8 Jul 2030
The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.
Squad8 Jul 2030
Gonzalo Gamarra 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.
Squad8 Jul 2030
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Nicolò Ceschini is 22, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Squad8 Jul 2030
Words at Floriana training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Kauan 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.
Squad8 Jul 2030
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Charlie Stewart commits to Floriana for another 3 years.
In brief
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Boardroom
100% of the income goes out in wages at Floriana
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Boardroom
$445.8K on the table at Floriana
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Boardroom
Floriana sign 7 boys into the academy
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Boardroom
The Floriana production line keeps running
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match17 Jun 2030
Floriana up to position 1
43 points on the board and a place in the leading group. Nobody at the ground is saying the word out loud yet.
Market17 Jun 2030
The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.
Squad17 Jun 2030
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Charlie Stewart is 21, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad10 Jun 2030
“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.
Squad10 Jun 2030
Gonzalo Gamarra 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.
Squad10 Jun 2030
Filippo Grosso is a better footballer than he was
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.
Squad10 Jun 2030
Words at Floriana training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Ludovico D'Orazio 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.
Boardroom10 Jun 2030
Wages eat 99% of everything Floriana earn
There is a figure at which a wage bill stops being ambitious and becomes the reason nothing else is possible, and this club has reached it. Nothing is left over for a transfer, a stand or a rainy afternoon.
Market10 Jun 2030
Both sides expect a conversation in the coming days. Floriana will name a price, and everything after that is arithmetic.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad27 May 2030
Fede Varela 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.
Squad27 May 2030
Words at Floriana training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Kauan 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.
Squad27 May 2030
15 days, the medical staff say, and medical staff are optimists by profession. The team sheet will look wrong without him.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad14 Jan 2030
Guilherme Cioletti damages knee ligaments — 30 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 30 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.
Squad14 Jan 2030
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 25 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Squad14 Jan 2030
Gonzalo Gamarra 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.
Squad14 Jan 2030
Words at Floriana training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Kauan 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.
Match12 Jan 2030
Hibernians left with the points after a 1‑2 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Player ratings14 Jan 2030
Successful dribbles: 18. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Player ratings14 Jan 2030
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.
Market14 Jan 2030
Birkirkara are about to pick up the phone
A conversation is coming this week. Floriana will put a number on him, and from there it stops being football and becomes arithmetic.
Player ratings14 Jan 2030
The substitution nobody applauded turned out to be the whole story. Floriana were going nowhere until he came on.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad1 Oct 2029
Guilherme Cioletti damages knee ligaments — 135 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 135 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.
Market1 Oct 2029
“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 Floriana, and it is not being withdrawn.
Match29 Sep 2029
The run at home goes on for Floriana
13 matches unbeaten here. Every visiting manager is asked about it in the week before, which is precisely why it keeps going.
Player ratings1 Oct 2029
Age has not caught Fede Varela yet — 7.89
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 7.89 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Match29 Sep 2029
Hard to beat is not the same as winning, but 9 matches without defeat is a foundation Floriana did not have in the autumn.
Squad1 Oct 2029
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Floriana may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Squad1 Oct 2029
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Floriana this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad1 Oct 2029
Kauan 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.
Player ratings1 Oct 2029
Successful dribbles: 18. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad30 Jul 2029
Andrea Caleffi: 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.” Floriana have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Squad30 Jul 2029
Filippo Grosso is a better footballer than he was
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 22 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.
Squad30 Jul 2029
Gonzalo Gamarra 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.
In brief
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Squad
Words at Floriana training over how hard people work
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Market
The shop window has Richard Garayev in it
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Boardroom
The Floriana production line keeps running
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Boardroom
The Floriana board choose calm
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad2 Jul 2029
David Mangion breaks a bone — 17 days out
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 17 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Market2 Jul 2029
“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 Floriana, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad2 Jul 2029
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Ranel Young is 23, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Squad2 Jul 2029
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Guilherme Cioletti and Floriana agree another 2 years.
Squad2 Jul 2029
Gonzalo Gamarra 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.
Boardroom2 Jul 2029
$393.6K on the table at Floriana
The board have answered with money instead of encouragement, which is the only answer a manager ever wants. Spending it well is now entirely his problem.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad4 Jun 2029
David Mangion breaks a bone — 45 days out
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 45 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Squad4 Jun 2029
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Floriana may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Market4 Jun 2029
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Gonzalo Gamarra wants continental football; whether Floriana can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
Squad4 Jun 2029
Gonzalo Gamarra 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.
Squad4 Jun 2029
Words at Floriana training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Kauan 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.
Market4 Jun 2029
No place for Thabo Mile in the plan
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Thabo Mile has his answer from Floriana; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
Boardroom4 Jun 2029
$393.6K on the table at Floriana
The board have answered with money instead of encouragement, which is the only answer a manager ever wants. Spending it well is now entirely his problem.
Market4 Jun 2029
He is 19, and nobody at Floriana signed him for this season. Deals like this are judged in four years, by people who may not still be in the building.
Market4 Jun 2029
Floriana have made Richard Garayev available for transfer. A career at this club is over in all but paperwork.
In brief
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Boardroom
The Floriana production line keeps running
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Boardroom
Floriana board back the manager
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad7 May 2029
An individual honour is a strange thing in a team game, and the best of them are never argued with. He has had the sort of year that ends with his name being read out, and Floriana have had the benefit of it.
Squad7 May 2029
Fede Varela 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 Floriana this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad7 May 2029
Ludovico D'Orazio 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.
Squad7 May 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.
Boardroom7 May 2029
Floriana release $393.6K 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.
Market7 May 2029
At 37, he has seen every situation this season can produce, twice. The legs will be managed; the head is the purchase.
In brief
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Boardroom
Floriana sign a deal worth $71.1K a year
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Boardroom
Floriana keep producing them
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Boardroom
The Floriana board choose calm