109 games now with at least two against. The back line has been rearranged, the goalkeeper has been backed publicly, and the goals keep going in anyway.
The words a physio says slowly. 103 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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 92 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 8 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Lukas Junuzovic provided it, and the 8.47 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Grodig this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
9 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Grodig and SV Ried in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
The words a physio says slowly. 110 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.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Grodig will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 7 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Kobe Agbude 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.
7 attempts, none of them in. He got into the right places all afternoon, which is the hard part, and did the easy part badly — and that is the version of a bad day a manager can live with.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 86 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Grodig this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
In brief
SquadWords at Grodig training over how hard people work
101 games now with at least two against. The back line has been rearranged, the goalkeeper has been backed publicly, and the goals keep going in anyway.
1‑8 to Sturm Graz, 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.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 8 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.31 at 33, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Defending was optional and nobody took up the option. 9 goals between Grodig and Sturm Graz, and not one of the people who paid to be there will ask for the money back.
Squad26 Oct 2037
Words at Grodig training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rocco Vicol 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.
Two or more conceded in each of the last 98 matches. It is not one mistake repeating itself, which would be the easier thing to fix; it is a different one every week.
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.
9 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Grodig and Austria Wien in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
Squad5 Oct 2037
Rocco Vicol 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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 22-year-old it feels ownership of. Lukas Junuzovic has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Grodig will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Squad24 Aug 2037
Rocco Vicol 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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 22-year-old it feels ownership of. Lukas Junuzovic has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
Martin Lienhart 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.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Grodig this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
38 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Grodig lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Grodig will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.