The words a physio says slowly. 20 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Adelaide United this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad18 Dec 2034
Ajak Riak 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.
Nobody's fault and entirely his: a goal that goes into the book with his name against it and nothing about it intended. Adelaide United deserved better, and so did he.
The words a physio says slowly. 27 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.
Dylan Pierias 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
Jonny Yull 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 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Adelaide United this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jonny Yull 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.
Sydney FC made Adelaide United work for it, but the scoreboard read 2‑1 at the end and the table does not ask how.
Squad4 Dec 2034
Eli Fisher is the division's best young player this month
At 20 he has spent a month being better than everybody his age in the league, which is a different and harder thing than one good afternoon. Adelaide United will try very hard not to make too much of it.
The words a physio says slowly. 41 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.
Brisbane Roar go through and Adelaide United go home, 0‑2 the scoreline that did it. The dressing room will call the league the priority now, because that is what dressing rooms say.
Dylan Pierias 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Ajak Riak 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.
Marked 8.26 — 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.
49 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Adelaide United lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Adelaide United this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
4 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Adelaide United can tell you which week it ends in.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jonny Yull 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Adelaide United this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jonny Yull 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.