Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason IF Elfsborg will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Squad25 Nov 2047
Daniel Butler 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at IF Elfsborg this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
48 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. AIK lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Ondřej Hastík 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.
IFK Norrkoping will keep picking him until June and will get nothing for him after it. Guillermo Jimenez has pre-agreed a move to AIK, and the only people who lose in that arrangement are the ones who let the contract run down.
In brief
SquadWords at AIK training over how hard people work
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason AIK will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
2 in front and in complete control, and it finished with Falkenberg the happier side. There is no version of this afternoon that AIK will enjoy reviewing.
Player ratings15 Oct 2046
Marcus Quaison, 18, plays like he has been here for years — 7.89
A mark of 7.89 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 18-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Ondřej Hastík 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. Stefano Agresta 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.
At 18 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
Every touch is being weighed now, in print and everywhere else. Some players grow into that and some are quietly ruined by it, and nobody knows which in advance.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason AIK will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” AIK have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Vegard Linnes 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.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason AIK will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Player ratings20 Aug 2046
A brace, and Sam Jansson takes the afternoon — 8.37
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Sam Jansson provided it, and the 8.37 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Ondřej Hastík 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. Vegard Linnes 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.
272 graduates from an academy now rated 15 out of 20. A club this size does not survive any other way, and every name on that list is known in the town.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason AIK will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
It is a specific kind of quiet, a ground watching a winning position dissolve. Orebro kept coming because nothing stopped them, and AIK will be asked about the last half hour all week.
6 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 AIK this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad23 Jul 2046
Martin Ekdal 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 one version of being left out a player cannot argue with, and the one he takes worst. Somebody else has been better and the team sheet says so, in public, every week until it changes.
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.
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.
One scored and one made, which is a different afternoon from scoring twice and an easier one to overlook. Marked 7.90, and involved in 2 of his side's goals.
Ondřej Hastík 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.
Squad25 Jun 2046
Raphael Canut 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.
Every touch is being weighed now, in print and everywhere else. Some players grow into that and some are quietly ruined by it, and nobody knows which in advance.
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.
Ondřej Hastík 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. Vegard Linnes 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 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.
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.
Ondřej Hastík 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.
1‑2 to Kalmar FF, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
Squad30 Apr 2046
Martin Ekdal 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 no complaint available here and everybody involved knows it, which does not make the walk to the bench any shorter. Form is the only currency in football that cannot be borrowed against.