There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 7.89 at 33, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Imad Faraj was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Neftchi this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Two goals and a mark of 8.72 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Neftchi they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
6 games unbeaten now. Some were earned and some were survived, but a habit is forming — and habits are the hardest thing in football to play against.
Squad25 Sep 2028
Imad Faraj 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.
Player ratings25 Sep 2028
Freddy Vargas was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.47. 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.
Nicolas Martins 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.
“The players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 4‑0, Samir Nadirov could afford to be generous.
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at Qarabag is saying, and nobody at Neftchi is enjoying the guessing.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Kenan Pirić was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
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.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Neftchi know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Position 4 on 36 points, and the places that carry a European ticket are close enough to count. Seasons like this are decided by two results in April, and the club knows which two.
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.
“Some mornings you wake up and you are still a long way from everything you know.” It is not the football and it never was; Neftchi are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
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 Moustapha Seck is on it.
Nothing in writing and nothing in public: a word about playing time, given face to face at Neftchi. The team sheets over the next month will show whether it was worth having.
Numbers do not stay secret in a dressing room. He is not asking for more than he is worth; he is asking why somebody beside him is worth more, and Neftchi have no good answer.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Neftchi heard it as anything else.
Sabail will keep picking him until June and will get nothing for him after it. Wandson has pre-agreed a move to Neftchi, and the only people who lose in that arrangement are the ones who let the contract run down.
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 Falaye Sacko is on it.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Vincent Aboubakar trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Every shape has positions in it and this one does not have his. Neftchi will either change the shape, change his job, or change his club, and he is waiting to hear which.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Neftchi know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Nobody at Neftchi 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.
Nicolas Martins 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.
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation Neftchi are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.
A new face in his position, and Falaye Sacko suddenly has to win back what he thought he owned. Neftchi have promised nothing — clubs rarely do at this stage.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Crawley Town will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Taylor Richards was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Newport County left with the points after a 0‑1 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
The dugout15 Mar 2027
The manager’s verdict
“That is on me. I pick the team and I picked wrong.” Managers say that when they mean it and when they need to be seen to, and after 0‑1 Henry Richardson left the room before anybody could ask which.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Crawley Town can pretend not to have heard.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Joachim Kayi Sanda is 20, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Taylor Richards 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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Aston Villa have kept their man, and Crawley Town go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
“We are a long way apart, and pretending otherwise helps nobody.” Neither side is close, and the calendar is not on the club's side.
Squad11 Jan 2027
Words at Crawley Town training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rhys Chadwick 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.
Crawley Town have made the call to Felgueiras. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.