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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at PSIM this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at PSIM has been clear about where Deri Corfe stands, which is more than many ever get.
Maluku Utara United go through and PSIM go home, 0‑1 the scoreline that did it. The dressing room will call the league the priority now, because that is what dressing rooms say.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Anis Khemaissia 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.
Deri Corfe 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.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 17 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
14 defensive actions and a clean sheet at the end of them. A defender's afternoon can only be told by what did not happen, which is why nobody makes a highlights package out of one and every manager in the division would take it.
Two goals and a mark of 9.91 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
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.
4 wins on the spin now, and the question has changed from whether the run ends to who ends it. Confidence like this cannot be bought; it has to be earned exactly this way.
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 PSIM this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Khalifa Sembaij is living that version at PSIM, and it tends to show in the first month.
The paperwork is done long before the player is. Rizwan Haikal has agreed terms to come here when his current deal runs out, which means PSIM have spent a summer's transfer budget on a phone call.
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 PSIM this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The accountants will call it good business and they will be right, which is not the point anybody outside the boardroom is making. Savio Sheva was one of the reasons people came, and $84.0K does not replace that by itself.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what PSIM can pretend not to have heard.
Nothing happens for months and then he simply arrives, at no cost, having signed a pre-contract while still turning out for somebody else. It is the least dramatic way to sign a footballer and frequently the shrewdest.
In brief
SquadWords at PSIM training over how hard people work
The words a physio says slowly. 24 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Anis Khemaissia 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.
32 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. PSIM lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what PSIM can pretend not to have heard.
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.
74 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. PSIM lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what PSIM can pretend not to have heard.
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 offer from Persija for Zé Valente 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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what PSIM can pretend not to have heard.
The chase for Achmad Iqbal Bachtiar ended with $130.0K changing hands and Semen Padang out of reasons to say no. The supporters will judge the fee the only way that matters: on Saturdays.
It is the rarest sequence in football: supporters ask for something, and the club goes and does it. $130.0K for Achmad Iqbal Bachtiar, and for one week nobody is complaining about anything.
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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what PSIM can pretend not to have heard.
Add another name to the list: Madura United have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Riyatno Abiyoso. The answer from PSIM has not changed — yet.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Anis Khemaissia 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.
Marked 8.96 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
20 defensive actions and a clean sheet at the end of them. A defender's afternoon can only be told by what did not happen, which is why nobody makes a highlights package out of one and every manager in the division would take it.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at PSIM this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.