Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Auckland City will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Auckland City is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad24 Mar 2036
Liam Gillion 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 Auckland City this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Nobody at Auckland City will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Auckland City will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Auckland City have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Ryan Kalms will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Auckland City the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Liam Gillion was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
6 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.
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Liam Gillion is on it.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Auckland City will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Matt Dibley-Dias will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Auckland City the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Elias Egerton and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Auckland City, another week without a signature from Jayden Smith.
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.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Auckland City will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. George Plusnin will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Auckland City the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Anare Tiko 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.
Squad3 Mar 2036
Liam Gillion 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.
Nobody at Auckland City will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Auckland City, and both men came out saying it was fine.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Auckland City will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Auckland City is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad25 Feb 2036
Words at Auckland City training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Liam Gillion 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.
“The easiest signature of my career.” Michael McCowatt and Auckland City agree another 3 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Nobody at Auckland City will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.