Marked for Tim Sutton
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Boardroom5 Jul 2032
the manager has until the next board meeting
What was said behind closed doors has now been said in front of a microphone. Everybody at Canterbury United can do the arithmetic, including the man it is aimed at.
Market5 Jul 2032
Only the photograph left for Monty Cacace
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Monty Cacace will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Canterbury United the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Market5 Jul 2032
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Canterbury United people have started saying his name in the past tense.
Squad5 Jul 2032
Winston Van Hattum and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Transfer targets5 Jul 2032
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Auckland City have kept their man, and Canterbury United go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Squad5 Jul 2032
Oliver McCowatt 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.
Squad5 Jul 2032
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Tim Sutton and Canterbury United agree another 3 years.
Market5 Jul 2032
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Canterbury United, another week without a signature from Nicholas Grant.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Match28 Jun 2032
10 points, and a fixture list that is running out. The mathematics are not yet cruel, but they are no longer kind.
Boardroom28 Jun 2032
Nobody upstairs has said anything, which is the loudest thing they could do. Results buy silence in this game; the account at Canterbury United is running low.
Market28 Jun 2032
Only the photograph left for Marco Singh
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Marco Singh will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Canterbury United the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad28 Jun 2032
Nicholas Grant and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad28 Jun 2032
Words at Canterbury United training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Winston Van Hattum 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.
The dugout28 Jun 2032
The manager has not finished forgetting Marco Smith's mistake
Publicly it is behind everybody. It is not behind the man who picks the team, and the only place that shows is a team sheet. He will get another chance; he will get it in a match that matters less.
The dugout28 Jun 2032
“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.
The dugout28 Jun 2032
When it matters, Sam Fenton 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.
Market28 Jun 2032
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Canterbury United know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
The dugout1 Mar 2032
Stefan Lockyer: 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.” Canterbury United have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Market1 Mar 2032
“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 Canterbury United, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad1 Mar 2032
A season average of 7.27 at an age when most of his year group are still in the youth team. Canterbury United know what they have, and so, by now, does everybody else.
Market1 Mar 2032
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Canterbury United they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad1 Mar 2032
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Canterbury United this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad1 Mar 2032
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Tim Sutton commits to Canterbury United for another 3 years.
The dugout1 Mar 2032
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Canterbury United told Monty Cacace something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
The dugout1 Mar 2032
The manager makes an example of Jake Sutton
“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.
The dugout1 Mar 2032
Jai Garbett knocks on the manager's door
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Canterbury United, and both men came out saying it was fine.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market23 Feb 2032
Monty Cacace 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 Canterbury United can pretend not to have heard.
Squad23 Feb 2032
A fracture rules Ryan Sutton out for 18 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Canterbury United will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
The dugout23 Feb 2032
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Canterbury United may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Transfer targets23 Feb 2032
Canterbury United asked and Auckland City said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Squad23 Feb 2032
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Winston Van Hattum was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Squad23 Feb 2032
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Tim Sutton and Canterbury United agree another 3 years.
Squad23 Feb 2032
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Canterbury United this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Market23 Feb 2032
“There is a gap, and pretending there is not helps nobody.” Neither side has moved, and the calendar is working for exactly one of them.
The dugout23 Feb 2032
“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.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market17 Mar 2031
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Liberato Sutton will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Canterbury United the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad17 Mar 2031
Oliver McCowatt 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.
Squad17 Mar 2031
Words at Canterbury United training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Winston Van Hattum 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.
The dugout17 Mar 2031
Nobody will confirm this and nothing else explains the last month of selections. A costly error buys a player a period of being second choice that is always longer than the error was.
Market17 Mar 2031
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Canterbury United know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
The dugout17 Mar 2031
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.