Everything agreed with Austria Wien, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
Thomas Wober 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 thought about how hard another man trains, and Dominik Alaba was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Mattersburg asked and Ipswich Town said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Mattersburg have made the call to Wolfsberger AC. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Alexander Posch is on it.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Konrad Lindner signs something — a contract at Mattersburg or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Norwich City have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Norwich City asked and Ipswich Town said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Norwich City can pretend not to have heard.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Norwich City this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
A new manager did not pick last season’s side and does not care what it looked like. Jovon Makama has taken that personally, in the best sense, and Norwich City are seeing a version of him the last regime had stopped seeing.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Jovon Makama signs something — a contract at Norwich City or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
In brief
The dugoutMohamed Touré knocks on the manager’s door
$19.8M is a serious amount of money and it does not play centre-forward. Everybody in the dressing room knows who used to be looked at when it went wrong.
$21.8M on the table at Ipswich Town. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Bristol Rovers waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Norwich City is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
Norwich City asked and Nottingham Forest said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
“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 Norwich City, and it is not being withdrawn.
The terraces12 Jul 2027
Supporters turn on the $19.8M sale of José Córdoba
He is going to Nacional, the club has $19.8M it did not have on Friday, and the phone-ins have already decided how they feel about that. Selling well and selling somebody they loved are not the same skill.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Norwich City is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
41 days with the chair empty, a list of names that grows and shrinks by the day, and not one signature on anything. Every week that passes takes the best candidates off it.
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Norwich City people have started saying his name in the past tense.
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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Norwich City can pretend not to have heard.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Tottenham have kept their man, and Norwich City go back to a list with one name crossed off it.