Marked for Robert Thomas
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Boardroom29 Oct 2040
The scrutiny sharpens at Pianese
Nobody upstairs has said anything, which is the loudest thing they could do. Results buy silence in this game; the account at Pianese is running low.
Squad29 Oct 2040
Kleidi Xhani breaks a bone — 27 days out
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 27 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Market29 Oct 2040
“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.
Squad29 Oct 2040
Robert Thomas 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 Oct 2040
Words at Pianese training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Matis Brault 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.
Squad29 Oct 2040
“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 ratings29 Oct 2040
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.
Match27 Oct 2040
Ninety minutes, two goalkeepers with clean gloves, and not one finish worth keeping. Ravenna will be the happier side with the point.
Player ratings29 Oct 2040
10 defensive actions and a clean sheet at the end of them. A defender's afternoon can only be told by what did not happen, which is why nobody makes a highlights package out of one and every manager in the division would take it.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Crisis
The terraces15 Oct 2040
Anger at Pianese spills outside the ground
It has stopped being a mood in the stands and started being something organised. Boards can ignore a bad atmosphere for a long time; they cannot ignore this stage of it for very long at all.
Match13 Oct 2040
2 goals to the good, and then a slow surrender of everything that had been earned. Giuseppe Brugnoli will not be the one blamed for it, but nobody at Pianese escapes the conversation that follows a collapse like this.
Player ratings15 Oct 2040
A brace, and Giuseppe Brugnoli takes the afternoon — 8.84
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Giuseppe Brugnoli provided it, and the 8.84 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Squad15 Oct 2040
A fracture rules Kleidi Xhani out for 42 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Pianese will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Market15 Oct 2040
“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 Pianese, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad15 Oct 2040
Danil Anosov 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 Pianese this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad15 Oct 2040
Words at Pianese training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Matis Brault 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 Oct 2040
Wages eat 116% of everything Pianese 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.
Squad15 Oct 2040
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Matis Brault, and the manager let it.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad24 Sep 2040
A fracture rules Michele Voltan out for 28 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Pianese will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Match19 Sep 2040
Pianese bow out of the cup
Lecce go through and Pianese go home, 1‑3 the scoreline that did it. The dressing room will call the league the priority now, because that is what dressing rooms say.
Market24 Sep 2040
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Pianese can pretend not to have heard.
Squad24 Sep 2040
A one-man rearguard from Ivo Petrov
There were 8 saves in it, and at least three that had no business being saves at all. The ten outfield players owe him a drink and they know it.
Player ratings24 Sep 2040
A brace, and Michael Laimer takes the afternoon — 8.39
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Michael Laimer provided it, and the 8.39 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Market24 Sep 2040
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Niccolò Mazzantini will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Pianese the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad24 Sep 2040
Danil Anosov 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.
Match22 Sep 2040
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Michael Laimer. 2‑0 against Bra, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Squad24 Sep 2040
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Sənan Muradlı, and the manager let it.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match26 Mar 2040
Pianese sink to position 16
23 points, and a fixture list that is running out. The mathematics are not yet cruel, but they are no longer kind.
Player ratings26 Mar 2040
Robert Thomas pops up at the right end — 7.76
7.76, 1 on the scoresheet, and the specific comedy of a back-four player celebrating like somebody who does this every week. He does not, and that is exactly why the ground reacted the way it did.
Squad26 Mar 2040
Danil Anosov 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 Pianese this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad26 Mar 2040
Words at Pianese training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Matis Brault 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.
Squad26 Mar 2040
Matis Brault gets it from the manager
“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.
Match24 Mar 2040
It finished 1‑1, and it somehow always looked like it would. One of those afternoons where the table moves less than the tempers.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Match30 Jan 2040
Pianese sink to position 17
16 points, and a fixture list that is running out. The mathematics are not yet cruel, but they are no longer kind.
Market30 Jan 2040
Robert Thomas hands in a written request
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Pianese can pretend not to have heard.
Squad30 Jan 2040
Markus Weimann: 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.” Pianese have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Squad30 Jan 2040
Danil Anosov 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 Pianese this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Match28 Jan 2040
It finished 2‑1, and it was Giuseppe Brugnoli’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Pianese.
Squad30 Jan 2040
Words at Pianese training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Matis Brault 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.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
The terraces9 Jan 2040
The mood at Pianese has turned into something else
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
Market9 Jan 2040
“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.
Squad9 Jan 2040
“I was told what my role would be, and I signed on that basis. It has not happened.” A grievance with a date attached is the hardest kind to settle.
Squad9 Jan 2040
There were 7 saves in it, and at least three that had no business being saves at all. The ten outfield players owe him a drink and they know it.
Squad9 Jan 2040
“The easiest signature of my career.” Danil Anosov and Pianese agree another 2 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Squad9 Jan 2040
The medical room confirms 30 days on the sidelines for Max Kuczynski, and a plan built around him now has to be rebuilt.
Match7 Jan 2040
A bad afternoon for Pianese against Ascoli
2‑3 to Ascoli, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
Boardroom9 Jan 2040
146% of the income goes out in wages at Pianese
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.
Player ratings9 Jan 2040
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.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad8 Aug 2039
A fracture rules Matis Brault out for 30 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Pianese will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Boardroom8 Aug 2039
The board’s statement ran to three sentences and one of them mentioned results. Philipp Scholz has managed long enough to translate: win soon, or the next statement is shorter.
Boardroom8 Aug 2039
The Pianese board call everybody in
Nothing has been announced and everybody understands what it means. A board that summons the whole football department on a Tuesday morning is a board that has stopped believing the problem will fix itself.
Squad8 Aug 2039
Danil Anosov 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 Pianese this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Boardroom8 Aug 2039
The owner puts $658.0K into Pianese
This is money that keeps the lights on rather than money that buys a centre-half, and the difference is the whole story. A club funded by its owner rather than by its football has exactly one conversation left ahead of it.
Boardroom8 Aug 2039
Pianese cannot sign anybody
The embargo bars a fee being paid for a player, whatever the manager thinks the squad needs. Every rumour printed about this club between now and its lifting is a rumour about a deal that cannot happen.
In brief
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Squad
Words at Pianese training over how hard people work
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Market
The clock does Birk Træet’s negotiating for him
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Squad
Robert Thomas gets it from the manager