111 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Admira Wacker lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Admira Wacker will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
It finished 0-4. A cup exit is a disappointment; this was a public dismantling, and the difference between the two is the number of people who will still be talking about it in August.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Admira Wacker have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Two or more conceded in each of the last 4 matches. It is not one mistake repeating itself, which would be the easier thing to fix; it is a different one every week.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.95 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Admira Wacker have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Admira Wacker this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
9 goals and a season average of 7.55 will do that. The space he used to find has gone; he keeps scoring anyway, which is the mark of the real thing.
Squad29 Sep 2036
Amer Mehić 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.
9 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.
Player ratings29 Sep 2036
Mario Maroto was on a different afternoon to everybody else
9.13. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Admira Wacker this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad19 May 2036
Amer Mehić 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
SquadMario Maroto has become a man the manager trusts
BoardroomThe Admira Wacker production line keeps running