Marked for Thomas Mathieu
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match22 Dec 2035
13 matches without a win for Novara
The run now stands at 13, and the questions being asked around Novara are no longer polite ones.
Squad24 Dec 2035
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Novara may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Squad24 Dec 2035
Tempers go at Novara
Elia Boseggia 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.
Boardroom24 Dec 2035
Novara counting the cost
The accounts make uncomfortable reading. Wages first and ambition second is the order of business at Novara now.
Squad24 Dec 2035
Words at Novara training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Eyob Zambataro 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.
Match22 Dec 2035
1‑2 to Cittadella, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
Squad24 Dec 2035
The manager makes an example of Eyob Zambataro
“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.
The terraces24 Dec 2035
Everybody has an opinion about Elia Boseggia
He is the name in every column and on every phone-in, which is a heavy thing to carry at any age. Some footballers thrive on it; others are quietly finished by it.
Player ratings24 Dec 2035
Successful dribbles: 12. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad5 Nov 2035
Lautaro Dufur breaks a bone — 21 days out
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 21 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Match31 Oct 2035
The cup run ends for Novara
1‑3 against Napoli, and the road stops here. Cup exits are quick deaths — no second leg, no next week, just the league from now until May.
Match3 Nov 2035
The wait goes on for Novara
6 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
Squad5 Nov 2035
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Tommaso Maressa commits to Novara for another 3 years.
Squad5 Nov 2035
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Novara this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad5 Nov 2035
Yohan Cassubie 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.
Boardroom5 Nov 2035
122% of the income goes out in wages at Novara
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.
The terraces5 Nov 2035
Every touch is being weighed now, in print and everywhere else. Some players grow into that and some are quietly ruined by it, and nobody knows which in advance.
Player ratings5 Nov 2035
Successful dribbles: 12. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad22 Oct 2035
Lautaro Dufur breaks a bone — 35 days out
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 35 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Squad22 Oct 2035
Thomas Mathieu: 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.” Novara have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Squad22 Oct 2035
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Novara this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad4 Jun 2035
A fracture rules Yohan Cassubie out for 86 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Novara will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Squad4 Jun 2035
Manuel Bertolini damages knee ligaments — 34 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 34 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.
Market4 Jun 2035
“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.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad29 Jan 2035
Tate Xavier-Jones damages knee ligaments — 65 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 65 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.
Player ratings29 Jan 2035
Successful dribbles: 29. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad29 Jan 2035
Tempers go at Novara
Eyob Zambataro 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 2035
Tommaso Maressa 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.
Match27 Jan 2035
Renate left with the points after a 0‑1 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Market29 Jan 2035
The name of Claudio Rizzi has come up in conversations Novara were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Squad29 Jan 2035
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Thomas Mathieu commits to Novara for another 2 years.
Boardroom29 Jan 2035
93% of the income goes out in wages at Novara
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.
Market29 Jan 2035
Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Francesco Rodio’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad11 Dec 2034
Tate Xavier-Jones damages knee ligaments — 115 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 115 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.
Match9 Dec 2034
6 matches without a win for Novara
The run now stands at 6, and the questions being asked around Novara are no longer polite ones.
Market11 Dec 2034
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Novara can pretend not to have heard.
Match9 Dec 2034
Whatever happens, Novara do not lose
8 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.
Market11 Dec 2034
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Filippo Lucchesi will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Novara the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad11 Dec 2034
Tempers go at Novara
Leonardo Di Cosmo 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 Dec 2034
Words at Novara training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Eyob Zambataro 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.
Squad11 Dec 2034
“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.
Player ratings11 Dec 2034
Some games turn on a moment; this one turned on a man. 7.68 on the card, and the Novara support went home talking about one name.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad13 Nov 2034
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Novara may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Market13 Nov 2034
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Novara they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad13 Nov 2034
Tempers go at Novara
Leonardo Di Cosmo 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.
Squad13 Nov 2034
Words at Novara training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Eyob Zambataro 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 ratings13 Nov 2034
A mark of 7.54, and nobody in the ground would argue with it. He was involved in everything that mattered and most of what did not.
Squad13 Nov 2034
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.
Player ratings13 Nov 2034
Successful dribbles: 13. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Match11 Nov 2034
The crowd waited for a goal that never came. Alcione Milano defended in numbers and left with what they came for, and the two sides could be playing still without troubling a scorer.
Market13 Nov 2034
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Novara know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad23 Oct 2034
Roberto Ranieri damages knee ligaments — 34 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 34 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.
Squad23 Oct 2034
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Novara may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Market23 Oct 2034
“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.
Squad23 Oct 2034
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Novara this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad23 Oct 2034
Eyob Zambataro 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.
Match21 Oct 2034
0‑1 to Lumezzane, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad25 Sep 2034
Elia Boseggia decides it from twelve yards
3 kept out in the shoot-out, and a stadium that will still be describing them in twenty years. A goalkeeper only needs one of these to be remembered forever.
Squad25 Sep 2034
Roberto Ranieri damages knee ligaments — 64 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 64 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.
Player ratings25 Sep 2034
Successful dribbles: 35. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Match20 Sep 2034
Novara through in the cup
A 1‑1 win over Gubbio, and the draw for the next round can be watched with some interest for once.
Match23 Sep 2034
A 2-goal lead gone for Novara
It is a specific kind of quiet, a ground watching a winning position dissolve. Triestina kept coming because nothing stopped them, and Novara will be asked about the last half hour all week.
Match23 Sep 2034
The wait goes on for Novara
7 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
Market25 Sep 2034
“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.
Squad25 Sep 2034
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Novara may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Squad25 Sep 2034
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Novara this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad28 Aug 2034
A knee injury of the worst kind for Roberto Ranieri
93 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Novara lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Market28 Aug 2034
“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 Novara, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad28 Aug 2034
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Novara this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad28 Aug 2034
Eyob Zambataro 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.
Squad28 Aug 2034
“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.
Player ratings28 Aug 2034
Tommaso Maressa was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.37. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
Match26 Aug 2034
It finished 1‑1, and it somehow always looked like it would. One of those afternoons where the table moves less than the tempers.
Market28 Aug 2034
Both sides expect a conversation in the coming days. Novara will name a price, and everything after that is arithmetic.
Market28 Aug 2034
The name of Leonardo Di Cosmo keeps appearing in other people's back pages. Novara say nothing, which says plenty.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad21 Aug 2034
A knee injury of the worst kind for Roberto Ranieri
100 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Novara lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Market21 Aug 2034
“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 Novara, and it is not being withdrawn.
Boardroom21 Aug 2034
The board have signed the man in the dugout to a longer contract, which says more than any statement of support. Stability is easy to promise and costly to keep.
Market21 Aug 2034
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Novara they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad21 Aug 2034
Tempers go at Novara
Elia Boseggia 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.
Squad21 Aug 2034
Thomas Mathieu 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.
Boardroom21 Aug 2034
Graduation day at Novara
7 boys move up, and somewhere in the building the people who coached them at twelve are quietly having the best morning of their working year. Nothing about this shows up in a result and it is why the academy exists.
Squad21 Aug 2034
Words at Novara training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Eyob Zambataro 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.
Market21 Aug 2034
One of our own: Luigi Testa joins the Novara first team
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Luigi Testa is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad31 Jul 2034
A knee injury of the worst kind for Roberto Ranieri
123 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Novara lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Market31 Jul 2034
Pineto come back empty-handed
The bid was some way short and Novara did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Squad31 Jul 2034
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Novara this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad31 Jul 2034
Eyob Zambataro 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.
Squad31 Jul 2034
At 25 the improving is meant to be over. It is not: 3 points better than the mark taken at the start of the year, which is the sort of thing that happens to players who take the boring parts of the job seriously.
Market31 Jul 2034
The name of Leonardo Di Cosmo keeps appearing in other people's back pages. Novara say nothing, which says plenty.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad10 Jul 2034
Raffaele Bianco damages knee ligaments — 104 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 104 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.
Market10 Jul 2034
“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.
Squad10 Jul 2034
Tempers go at Novara
Leonardo Di Cosmo 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.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Market12 Jun 2034
“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 Novara, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad12 Jun 2034
Tempers go at Novara
Eyob Zambataro 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.
Squad12 Jun 2034
Tommaso Maressa 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.
Boardroom12 Jun 2034
Novara counting the cost
The accounts make uncomfortable reading. Wages first and ambition second is the order of business at Novara now.
Squad12 Jun 2034
Andrea Di Siena has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at Novara 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.
Market12 Jun 2034
Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Francesco Rodio’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Market15 May 2034
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Novara is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Market15 May 2034
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Novara can pretend not to have heard.
Squad15 May 2034
Tempers go at Novara
Elia Boseggia 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.
Squad15 May 2034
Words at Novara training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Eyob Zambataro 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.
Boardroom15 May 2034
Novara counting the cost
The accounts make uncomfortable reading. Wages first and ambition second is the order of business at Novara now.
Squad15 May 2034
“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.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Match15 Apr 2034
No mercy from Novara
Pro Vercelli will want this one forgotten quickly: 3‑0, every duel lost, and a long ride home. Novara were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.
Squad17 Apr 2034
The match ball belongs to Andrea Chiummariello, whose 3 goals turned a difficult afternoon into a procession.
Market17 Apr 2034
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Selim Pellissard will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Novara the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Market17 Apr 2034
“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 Novara, and it is not being withdrawn.
Player ratings17 Apr 2034
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 7.82 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Squad17 Apr 2034
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Novara may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Boardroom17 Apr 2034
He will play here until the summer and then walk out of the door for free, having already signed elsewhere. Supporters will manage the first part of that sentence; it is the second they will struggle with.
Squad17 Apr 2034
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Novara this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Player ratings17 Apr 2034
Marked 9.59 — 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.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad10 Apr 2034
Bruno Scalise damages knee ligaments — 16 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 16 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.
Market10 Apr 2034
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Novara is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad10 Apr 2034
Tempers go at Novara
Eyob Zambataro 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 Apr 2034
Tommaso Maressa 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.
Squad10 Apr 2034
“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.
Match8 Apr 2034
Trento left with the points after a 0‑1 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Player ratings10 Apr 2034
Successful dribbles: 13. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Market10 Apr 2034
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Leonardo Di Cosmo signs something — a contract at Novara or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Market10 Apr 2034
Novara have made Thomas Mathieu available for transfer. A career at this club is over in all but paperwork.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match18 Mar 2034
0‑3 to Arzignano, and it was every bit as bad as the number suggests. There are defeats you argue about and defeats you apologise for; this was the second kind.
Market20 Mar 2034
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Selim Pellissard will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Novara the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Market20 Mar 2034
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Novara can pretend not to have heard.
Match18 Mar 2034
No end in sight to Novara's wait for a win
4 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Novara has to find a result from somewhere.
Boardroom20 Mar 2034
The rules permit it and it stings anyway. Selim Pellissard has agreed terms with Pescara for the summer, and until then he pulls on this shirt as a player who has already chosen his next one.
Squad20 Mar 2034
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Novara this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad20 Mar 2034
Words at Novara training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Tommaso Maressa 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.
Boardroom20 Mar 2034
The manager kept them in and said what needed saying. A response is expected on Saturday, and if it does not come the questions move upstairs.
Squad20 Mar 2034
4 goals and a season average of 7.30. Form like that gets noticed well beyond this town.