Chesterfield asked and Huddersfield Town said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Rhys Bennett 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.
Beryly Lubala 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.
Clubs make promises constantly and the page usually only hears about them when they are broken. This one was honoured, and the dressing room noticed that faster than any supporter did.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Konrad Wrzesiński was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Matthew Platt’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Chesterfield needing him to play as if none of it matters.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Lee Bonis trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
He asked about his future and was given an answer with minutes in it. The manager has now made a promise in a building where promises are remembered, and the clock on it has started.
The shrug has gone, the language is coming, and he now argues in training like somebody who expects to be here next year. Half a signing's value is this and none of it appears on a fee.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 21 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
At 23 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.
At 35, 3 points below where he was, and a body that has started charging interest. It happens to all of them and it is still the hardest paragraph on this page.
“The players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 2‑0, Jason Kelly could afford to be generous.
The shape wanted a different profile against this opponent, which is a real football answer and no comfort at all to the man it is about. He did nothing wrong and he did not play.
Kyle McFadzean 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.
Something was said to Louie Marsh and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Chesterfield has been clear about where Dilan Markanday stands, which is more than many ever get.
He used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against Fleetwood Town in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
Tom Pearce has done the arithmetic and does not like the answer. Nothing corrodes a squad faster, and no club has ever solved it by explaining the wage structure to a footballer.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Chesterfield, and both men came out saying it was fine.