Marked for Massimo Colombo
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad20 Oct 2031
62 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Salernitana lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Market20 Oct 2031
“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.
Squad20 Oct 2031
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Salernitana this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Player ratings20 Oct 2031
Successful dribbles: 21. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
Squad20 Oct 2031
Words at Salernitana training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Ettore Quirini 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.
Match18 Oct 2031
Foggia made Salernitana work for it, but the scoreboard read 1‑0 at the end and the table does not ask how.
Squad20 Oct 2031
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Salernitana can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
Player ratings20 Oct 2031
Nobody on the pitch touched Ismail Achik
7.96, and no serious argument from anybody who was there. Salernitana had eleven men on the pitch and one of them decided how it went.
The dugout20 Oct 2031
“We earned that. I asked them for a reaction and I got one, and now I want the same again on Saturday.” Andrea Bellini on a 1‑0 afternoon that pleased him more than he was prepared to show.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad11 Aug 2031
Thiago Terrazas damages knee ligaments — 132 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 132 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.
Market11 Aug 2031
“I listened, I thought about it, and I am staying. That is the whole story.” The clubs had agreed a fee. Tiziano Sartori had not agreed to go, which turned out to be the part that mattered.
The dugout11 Aug 2031
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Salernitana may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Squad11 Aug 2031
Paolo Ghiglione 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.
Squad11 Aug 2031
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Antonino La Gumina was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Boardroom11 Aug 2031
Nothing happens for months and then he simply arrives, at no cost, having signed a pre-contract while still turning out for somebody else. It is the least dramatic way to sign a footballer and frequently the shrewdest.
Boardroom11 Aug 2031
Wages eat 88% of everything Salernitana 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.
Market11 Aug 2031
He is 18, and nobody at Salernitana signed him for this season. Deals like this are judged in four years, by people who may not still be in the building.
Squad11 Aug 2031
“The easiest signature of my career.” Jan Stanek and Salernitana agree another 4 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Market2 Jun 2031
“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 Salernitana, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad2 Jun 2031
Demba Thiam 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.
Squad2 Jun 2031
Antonino La Gumina 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 dugout2 Jun 2031
The manager makes an example of Mattia Vitale
“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.
Squad2 Jun 2031
A place in the month's best eleven for Paolo Ghiglione
Four or five weekends of consistency, judged against everybody in the division doing his job. Paolo Ghiglione has come out of that comparison in the side, and Salernitana have had the benefit of every one of those afternoons.
The dugout2 Jun 2031
When it matters, Demba Thiam plays
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.
The dugout2 Jun 2031
Caleb Ekuban knocks on the manager’s door
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Caleb Ekuban trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Market2 Jun 2031
The Ismail Achik talk will not go away
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Salernitana know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Boardroom2 Jun 2031
The window is open, and with it the only month of the year when a supporter’s hopes are limited by nothing but arithmetic. The board know the arithmetic; the supporters know the hopes.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market17 Jun 2030
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Salernitana have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Transfer targets17 Jun 2030
$480.0K settles it between the clubs for Pietro Passador
Virtus Entella have accepted the money. What Salernitana do not yet have is the man, and between here and the photograph is a conversation about wages that both sides are dreading.
Transfer targets17 Jun 2030
No deal for Luca Moro at that price
Salernitana offered $2.0M; Padova said it was not close. The manager will be told the money is still there for the right player, which is what managers are told.
Transfer targets17 Jun 2030
Everything agreed with Genoa, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
Squad17 Jun 2030
The medical room confirms 27 days on the sidelines for Pietro Baraldi, and a plan built around him now has to be rebuilt.
Squad17 Jun 2030
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Salernitana this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Boardroom17 Jun 2030
Nothing happens for months and then he simply arrives, at no cost, having signed a pre-contract while still turning out for somebody else. It is the least dramatic way to sign a footballer and frequently the shrewdest.
The dugout17 Jun 2030
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Caleb Ekuban, and the manager let it.
Squad17 Jun 2030
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Giammarco Paglicci commits to Salernitana for another 3 years.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match29 Dec 2029
4 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.
Squad31 Dec 2029
Paolo Ghiglione and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Player ratings31 Dec 2029
Successful dribbles: 20. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Match29 Dec 2029
Beaten 0‑1, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Squad31 Dec 2029
Marco Festa pulls a muscle — 15 days out
The injury that keeps coming back, keeps being rushed back from, and quietly costs more careers than the dramatic ones. 15 days is the estimate; the honest figure depends on whether anybody is patient.
The dugout31 Dec 2029
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Gianluca Longobardi, and the manager let it.
The dugout31 Dec 2029
“I could talk about decisions and I could talk about luck. I will not. We lost.” The manager, 0‑1, and a press conference that lasted four minutes.
The dugout31 Dec 2029
Caleb Ekuban asks for a word with the manager
“I would rather say it to his face than read about it.” The meeting was requested by the player, which tells you most of what you need to know.
The dugout31 Dec 2029
Massimo Colombo has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at Salernitana 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.