Marked for Robert Damsgaard
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market18 Jun 2035
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Esbjerg people have started saying his name in the past tense.
Market18 Jun 2035
“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.
Transfer targets18 Jun 2035
Everything agreed with FC Nordsjaelland, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
Transfer targets18 Jun 2035
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. FC Nordsjaelland have kept their man, and Esbjerg go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Squad18 Jun 2035
A row about effort at Esbjerg
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Ask Rodahl was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Squad18 Jun 2035
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Esbjerg this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The dugout18 Jun 2035
“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.
Squad18 Jun 2035
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation Esbjerg are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.
Transfer targets18 Jun 2035
Esbjerg have made the call to Brondby. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad12 Mar 2035
72 days out for Emmanuel Kachi after a fracture
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Esbjerg will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Market12 Mar 2035
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Esbjerg can pretend not to have heard.
Market12 Mar 2035
Only the photograph left for Rasmus Flügge
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Rasmus Flügge will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Esbjerg the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Boardroom12 Mar 2035
Belts tighten at Esbjerg
The accounts are being read more closely than the results. Wages before ambition is the order of business now, and the manager has been told so.
Squad12 Mar 2035
A row about effort at Esbjerg
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Ask Rodahl was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Squad12 Mar 2035
A falling-out at Esbjerg
Raphael Canut and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad12 Mar 2035
15 days, the medical staff say, and medical staff are optimists by profession. The team sheet will look wrong without him.
The dugout12 Mar 2035
Ivan Novichkov is still being punished for one mistake
Nobody will confirm it and the team sheets confirm it every week. One error has bought him a spell as second choice that is already longer than the error deserved.
The dugout12 Mar 2035
“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
Uneasy
Market15 Jan 2035
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Esbjerg can pretend not to have heard.
The dugout15 Jan 2035
“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.
Squad15 Jan 2035
Ask Rodahl 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 Esbjerg this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Transfer targets15 Jan 2035
Esbjerg asked and FC Nordsjaelland said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Squad15 Jan 2035
Ivan Novichkov 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 dugout15 Jan 2035
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Emmanuel Okodugha, and the manager let it.
The dugout15 Jan 2035
The manager has not finished forgetting Ivan Novichkov'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.
Transfer targets15 Jan 2035
FC Nordsjaelland have been asked whether they would lend him. Loans are agreed quickly or not at all, and this one will be one or the other by the weekend.
Transfer targets15 Jan 2035
Brondby have been asked whether they would lend him. Loans are agreed quickly or not at all, and this one will be one or the other by the weekend.
From our football correspondent
Steady
The dugout4 Dec 2034
Robert Damsgaard: 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.” Esbjerg have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Squad4 Dec 2034
A falling-out at Esbjerg
Ask Rodahl and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad4 Dec 2034
Words at Esbjerg training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Alex Bonetig 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.
Squad4 Dec 2034
“Some mornings you wake up and you are still a long way from everything you know.” It is not the football and it never was; Esbjerg are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Squad4 Dec 2034
9 new faces, and Esbjerg are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
Player ratings4 Dec 2034
Marked 7.52. Ask anyone leaving the ground what settled it and you will get one name, which is the only award that has ever really counted.
Boardroom4 Dec 2034
Wages eat 86% of everything Esbjerg 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.
Match2 Dec 2034
It needed Ask Rodahl to find the net to bring anything home at all: 1‑1 against HB Køge, and half the dressing room will call it a point won.
The dugout4 Dec 2034
The manager makes an example of Soehail Hamdani
“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
Crisis
Market6 Nov 2034
“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.
Squad6 Nov 2034
Mads Freundlich 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.
Match4 Nov 2034
Beaten 1‑3, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Squad6 Nov 2034
Timo Stavitski 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.
The dugout6 Nov 2034
Sam Wijk 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.
Looking ahead6 Nov 2034
The fixture the rest of the division is looking forward to more than either of the sides in it. Both know a win changes the season and a defeat does not end it, which is what makes it hard to play.
Squad6 Nov 2034
Esbjerg are still strangers to each other
9 new signings in one window. Every one may be an upgrade and the side can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild the verdicts never mention.
The dugout6 Nov 2034
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Interim Coach after 1‑3, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
Squad6 Nov 2034
A place in the month's best eleven for Ask Rodahl
Four or five weekends of consistency, judged against everybody in the division doing his job. Ask Rodahl has come out of that comparison in the side, and Esbjerg have had the benefit of every one of those afternoons.