Marked for Davide Fabbri
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad28 May 2040
Cher Ndour 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.
Market28 May 2040
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Jakov Martinjak will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Fiorentina the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Market28 May 2040
Nicolò Giuliani comes back from a loan that worked
32 appearances and 19 goals away from here, and a player the manager did not have in August. Loans are sent out hoping for exactly this and most of them do not deliver it.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Match2 Nov 2039
Ravenna are out and Fiorentina go through, 3‑1 the final word. The bracket opens up a little, and everyone allows themselves a look at it.
Player ratings7 Nov 2039
A brace, and Niccolò Fortini takes the afternoon — 8.43
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Niccolò Fortini provided it, and the 8.43 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Squad7 Nov 2039
Cher Ndour 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.
Match5 Nov 2039
Whatever happens, Fiorentina do not lose
7 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.
Market7 Nov 2039
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Adriano Zanetti will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Fiorentina the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Player ratings7 Nov 2039
Successful dribbles: 16. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Player ratings7 Nov 2039
Marked 7.96 on an afternoon he ran from the first whistle to the last. Whatever else went wrong, Fiorentina had the best player on the pitch.
Squad7 Nov 2039
Gustavo Varela has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at Fiorentina 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.
Match5 Nov 2039
2‑2, and both dressing rooms will call it two points lost. A draw that asked plenty of questions and answered none of them.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Player ratings17 Oct 2039
Gustavo Varela, 34, rolls back the years — 7.88
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 7.88 at 34, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Squad17 Oct 2039
Cher Ndour 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 Fiorentina this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Player ratings17 Oct 2039
Jamal Iddrissou did the work nobody counts — 6.92
15 combined actions and 6.92. The job he did is the one that shows up as other people looking good, and the only reliable way to notice it is to watch what happens on the afternoons he is missing.
Player ratings17 Oct 2039
The game went through Ivan Sorokin — 6.75
Marked 6.75 on 9 actions at both ends of the pitch. Midfielders like this get described as unspectacular by people who have never tried to play against one.
Squad17 Oct 2039
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.
Match15 Oct 2039
1‑1, and both dressing rooms will call it two points lost. A draw that asked plenty of questions and answered none of them.
Market17 Oct 2039
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Fiorentina know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Squad17 Oct 2039
Davide Fabbri 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.
Squad17 Oct 2039
The manager makes an example of Jakov Martinjak
“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.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Player ratings19 Sep 2039
Age has not caught Gustavo Varela yet — 8.37
At 34 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.37 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Squad19 Sep 2039
Cher Ndour 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 Fiorentina this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Market19 Sep 2039
Only the photograph left for Leonardo Mazza
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Leonardo Mazza will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Fiorentina the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad19 Sep 2039
“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.
Match17 Sep 2039
2‑2, and both dressing rooms will call it two points lost. A draw that asked plenty of questions and answered none of them.
Squad19 Sep 2039
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.
Market19 Sep 2039
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Fiorentina know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Squad19 Sep 2039
Davide Fabbri 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 ratings19 Sep 2039
Cher Ndour runs at them all day
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.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match27 Aug 2039
0‑3 to Juventus, 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.
Market29 Aug 2039
The bid was some way short and Fiorentina did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Squad29 Aug 2039
Cher Ndour 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.
Player ratings29 Aug 2039
Ivan Sorokin did the work nobody counts — 6.65
9 combined actions and 6.65. The job he did is the one that shows up as other people looking good, and the only reliable way to notice it is to watch what happens on the afternoons he is missing.
Boardroom29 Aug 2039
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.
Squad29 Aug 2039
When it matters, Cher Ndour 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.
Loan watch29 Aug 2039
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Fiorentina, and 1 appearances in 10 say he has earned the hearing.
Squad29 Aug 2039
“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.
Market29 Aug 2039
Parma are about to pick up the phone
A conversation is coming this week. Fiorentina will put a number on him, and from there it stops being football and becomes arithmetic.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad25 Jul 2039
Cher Ndour 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 Fiorentina this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Market25 Jul 2039
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Fiorentina can pretend not to have heard.
Market25 Jul 2039
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Fiorentina is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Market25 Jul 2039
Add another name to the list: Juve Stabia have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Adriano Zanetti. The answer from Fiorentina has not changed — yet.
Squad25 Jul 2039
Cher Ndour has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at Fiorentina 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.
Loan watch25 Jul 2039
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Fiorentina, and 0 appearances in 5 say he has earned the hearing.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market13 Jun 2039
The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.
Squad13 Jun 2039
Cher Ndour 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 Fiorentina this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad13 Jun 2039
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.
Market13 Jun 2039
Gabriele Ricci is free to find somewhere else
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Fiorentina has been clear about where Gabriele Ricci stands, which is more than many ever get.
Squad13 Jun 2039
Davide Fabbri 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.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad16 May 2039
Cher Ndour 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 Fiorentina this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Loan watch16 May 2039
37 appearances away from home and 18 goals to show for them. Every one of them makes next summer's conversation a little more expensive.
Loan watch16 May 2039
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Fiorentina, and 0 appearances in 46 say he has earned the hearing.