20 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. NK Maribor lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Nobody makes a documentary about a hamstring and everybody in the game fears one. NK Maribor will be careful with the return date, because the second one is always worse than the first.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at NK Maribor this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and NK Maribor know it.
Add another name to the list: NK Krsko have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Paul Smith. The answer from NK Maribor has not changed — yet.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason NK Maribor will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
The words a physio says slowly. 117 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.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Harry Cook will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around NK Maribor the goodbyes have quietly begun.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at NK Maribor this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Everything was agreed until it was not, and Paul Smith reports back to NK Maribor with a summer to forget. Neither club is saying who walked away from the table.
In brief
SquadConnor Jales falls out with a teammate over standards
The words a physio says slowly. 124 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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what NK Maribor can pretend not to have heard.
The offer from NK Zavrc for Marcos Sosa was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” NK Maribor have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around NK Maribor they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
György Komáromi 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.
In brief
SquadJames Furlong falls out with a teammate over standards
Hard to beat is not the same as winning, but 16 matches without defeat is a foundation NK Maribor did not have in the autumn.
Player ratings27 Jul 2037
A brace, and Jure Ilicic takes the afternoon — 9.22
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Jure Ilicic provided it, and the 9.22 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
At 34 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 9.31 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Match25 Jul 2037
Another one collected away from home
6 on the bounce on the road for NK Maribor. The coaches leave early, arrive at unlovely grounds in the dark, and keep coming home with three points.
Add another name to the list: Rudar Velenje have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Oliver Hunter. The answer from NK Maribor has not changed — yet.
The offer from NK Krsko for Paul Smith was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at NK Maribor this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The offer from ND Gorica for Paul Smith was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. James Rowswell will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around NK Maribor the goodbyes have quietly begun.
György Komáromi 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.
Everyone has stopped pretending: Zenit will make the call about Nejc Viher this week. NK Maribor have a number in mind, and the number is not shy.
Squad22 Jun 2037
James Furlong 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.
A 3‑2 win over Olimpija Ljubljana, and the draw for the next round can be watched with some interest for once.
Match20 May 2037
Connor Jales wins it after the whistle should have gone
91 minutes played. Connor Jales found the finish in time that only existed because of earlier delays, and Olimpija Ljubljana went from a point to nothing inside one movement.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 9.07 at 34, and nobody on the pitch was better.
12 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere else.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around NK Maribor they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Match20 May 2037
Another one collected away from home
5 on the bounce on the road for NK Maribor. The coaches leave early, arrive at unlovely grounds in the dark, and keep coming home with three points.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at NK Maribor is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
György Komáromi 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.
Squad27 Apr 2037
James Furlong 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.
In brief
SquadThe manager has not finished forgetting Tio Cipot's mistake
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Paul Smith will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around NK Maribor the goodbyes have quietly begun.
György Komáromi 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.
Squad30 Mar 2037
James Furlong 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.
In brief
SquadThe manager has not finished forgetting Tio Cipot's mistake
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around NK Maribor they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
György Komáromi 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.
Squad2 Mar 2037
Words at NK Maribor training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Connor Jales 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.
Squad2 Mar 2037
The manager has not finished forgetting Tio Cipot'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.
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.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at NK Maribor, another week without a signature from Michael Mahecha.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason NK Maribor will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
“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 NK Maribor, and it is not being withdrawn.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at NK Maribor this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The offer from NK Krsko for Krzysztof Grosicki was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
Squad2 Feb 2037
Words at NK Maribor training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. James Furlong 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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 67 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
A 4‑1 win over NK Krsko, a place in the next round, and the quiet arithmetic every supporter does on the walk home: how many more until a final?
Player ratings24 Nov 2036
Rok Skubic could not have asked for more on his first appearance — 7.58
Debuts are survived rather than enjoyed. This one was enjoyed: 7.58, 1 goals, and a manager already being asked whether he starts again next week.
Player ratings24 Nov 2036
A brace, and Jure Ilicic takes the afternoon — 8.85
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Jure Ilicic provided it, and the 8.85 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 6 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Player ratings24 Nov 2036
Marcos Sosa, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 7.74
A mark of 7.74 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 21-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at NK Maribor is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at NK Maribor this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.