Nuno Santos 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.
Squad8 May 2028
Words at Trabzonspor training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Sidny Lopes Cabral 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.
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 month is long enough that nobody gets in by accident. Ernest Muçi is in the division's best eleven for it, which is a quieter compliment than an award and a more reliable one.
A clause somebody insisted on years ago, in a negotiation nobody remembers, has just paid Trabzonspor $19.0K. Poyraz Yıldırım left a long time ago; the paperwork stayed.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Ernest Muçi signs something — a contract at Trabzonspor or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
A year in and the language has not come, the city has not opened up, and he eats alone more often than anybody at Trabzonspor would like to admit. It is showing on Saturdays.
Position 2 on 80 points. Every season is a story and this is the last line of it, and now the club has three months to decide what the next one is about.
Position 2, 80 points, and the result everyone checks first is now theirs. The word is still not being said around the ground, which is how you know everyone is thinking it.
Player ratings1 May 2028
A brace, and Ernest Muçi takes the afternoon — 8.40
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Ernest Muçi provided it, and the 8.40 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Nuno Santos 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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Trabzonspor can pretend not to have heard.
At 34 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.00 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Centre-halves are allowed forward twice a season and are judged on what they do when they get there. Musah Mohammed scored, was marked 7.99, and got back before anybody noticed he had gone.
6 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Trabzonspor and Corum FK in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Sidny Lopes Cabral was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“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; Trabzonspor are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Ali Şahin Yılmaz 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.
In brief
The dugoutThe team sheet said everything about Umut Nayir
SquadDefences have started doubling up on Zeki Çelik
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the whole of the defence. 6 saves, several of them the kind nobody expects to see made, and ten outfield players who owe him a drink.
14 combined actions and 6.93. The job he did is the one that shows up as other people looking good, and the only reliable way to notice it is to watch what happens on the afternoons he is missing.
Squad10 Apr 2028
Words at Trabzonspor training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Sidny Lopes Cabral 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.
Nobody at Trabzonspor 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 point is a point and I will take it, but we should have had all three.” Volkan Kahveci after the 0‑0 draw, and the sentence every manager in the country said at some stage this weekend.
The team sheet says it in public every week until it changes. The only version of being dropped a footballer cannot argue with, and the one he takes hardest.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Trabzonspor can pretend not to have heard.
Ruslan Malinovskyi 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Sidny Lopes Cabral was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Nobody at Trabzonspor 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.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and René Mitongo trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
8 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
5 straight away victories. Sides that win away are usually sides that can defend and can counter, and the table has begun to reflect what those journeys have earned.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Sidny Lopes Cabral was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Nobody at Trabzonspor 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.
6 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.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 7.92 at 33, and nobody on the pitch was better.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Lucas is living that version at Trabzonspor, and it tends to show in the first month.
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Trabzonspor hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Trabzonspor this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Match4 Mar 2028
Another one collected away from home
4 on the bounce on the road for Trabzonspor. The coaches leave early, arrive at unlovely grounds in the dark, and keep coming home with three points.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Sidny Lopes Cabral was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
4‑0, and the margin flattered nobody — it could have carried another goal or two without complaint. Afternoons like this are why people keep coming.
Player ratings28 Feb 2028
A brace, and Umut Nayir takes the afternoon — 9.08
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Umut Nayir provided it, and the 9.08 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
5 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.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Trabzonspor have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Sidny Lopes Cabral was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.
Cup ties wait for somebody to seize them, and Emmanuel Martínez obliged against Rizespor. 4‑1 on the night, and the name in the next round’s hat is Trabzonspor.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 7.94 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
3 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Villarreal have kept their man, and Trabzonspor go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
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 ratings14 Feb 2028
Zeki Çelik was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.50. 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.
Marked 8.26 — 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.
José Aquino Allende 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.
In brief
Player ratingsThe game went through Wagner Pina — 7.75
The dugoutZeki Çelik has become a man the manager trusts
Position 3, 49 points, and the result everyone checks first is now theirs. The word is still not being said around the ground, which is how you know everyone is thinking it.
Beat anybody else and it is three points. Beat them, with his name on it, and it is a year of bragging rights for Trabzonspor and a story that will outlast his contract.
The deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 1 arrived, 9 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed one.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Trabzonspor this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Fluminense have kept their man, and Trabzonspor go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
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.
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Trabzonspor, and it is not being withdrawn.
Two goals and a mark of 8.23 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Trabzonspor this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Trabzonspor asked and Cruzeiro said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
He won it back and then made something of it, which is two jobs and the reason the scoreline looks the way it does. 11 combined actions and a mark of 6.80, and not one of them will make a highlights package.
The fixture the calendar is arranged around. Form goes out of the window, the table is not consulted, and for ninety minutes Trabzonspor will be judged on one thing only.
Minute 87, against Genclerbirligi, and a goal that felt like a win to everybody who had stayed. It was a draw. Nobody leaving the ground will describe it as one.
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Trabzonspor told Sidny Lopes Cabral something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
“I know what people will say. I know what I want, and it is here.” Toulouse FC had the fee agreed and the shirt ready; they did not have the player, and now they will not.
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Trabzonspor, and it is not being withdrawn.
The offer from Antalyaspor for Ali Şahin Yılmaz 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.
Trabzonspor asked and Boluspor said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
A 2‑1 win over Samsunspor, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Squad24 Jan 2028
Words at Trabzonspor training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Sidny Lopes Cabral 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.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 7.88 at 35, and nobody on the pitch was better.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Sidny Lopes Cabral and Trabzonspor agree another 5 years.
The goal that put Amedspor ahead was still being replayed on the concourse when Trabzonspor equalised, 1 minutes later. Leads are only worth what you do with them.
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 Fabinho is on it.
It finished 1‑1, and it somehow always looked like it would. One of those afternoons where the table moves less than the tempers.
The dugout20 Dec 2027
The view from the dugout
“We did not lose. Some weeks that is all you get, and I would rather have the point than not.” Volkan Kahveci chose the glass-half-full version of 1‑1; the supporters left with the other one.
In brief
Player ratingsNuno Santos beats them one at a time
Nobody at Trabzonspor 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.
He trains hard, says the right things and goes home to an empty flat. Nobody at Trabzonspor has done anything wrong, which is exactly what makes it so difficult to fix.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Trabzonspor, another week without a signature from Göktan Gürpüz.
Besiktas next, and one man in the Trabzonspor dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought of him.
Nothing in writing and nothing in public: a word about playing time, given face to face at Trabzonspor. The team sheets over the next month will show whether it was worth having.
Sidny Lopes Cabral 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.
Eyupspor will want this one forgotten quickly: 5‑2, every duel lost, and a long ride home. Trabzonspor were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Trabzonspor, and it is not being withdrawn.
Two goals and a mark of 8.64 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Benjamin Bouchouari provided it, and the 8.35 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Besiktas paid $7.7M and Trabzonspor took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
Two goals and a mark of 8.94 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Ruslan Malinovskyi 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.
6 goals in one match, Mohamed Salah on the scoresheet, and a scoreline that will look like a misprint. Neutrals could not have asked more of Trabzonspor and Gaziantep.
Marked 8.35 — 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.
Bodrum FK paid $610.0K and Trabzonspor took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
Corum FK paid $110.0K and Trabzonspor took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
Trabzonspor asked and Corum FK said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Trabzonspor, and 0 appearances in 5 say he has earned the hearing.
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 Ruslan Malinovskyi is on it.
He trains hard, says the right things and goes home to an empty flat. Nobody at Trabzonspor has done anything wrong, which is exactly what makes it so difficult to fix.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Sidny Lopes Cabral signs something — a contract at Trabzonspor or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Qualification is secured, and next season the big floodlit nights are continental ones. For the players it is a stage; for the accounts it is a lifeline; for the supporters it is passports.
An individual honour is a strange thing in a team game, and the best of them are never argued with. He has had the sort of year that ends with his name being read out, and Trabzonspor have had the benefit of it.
17 games, 0 goals, and a squad option that has arrived without a fee attached. The interesting question at Trabzonspor now is not whether he plays but who he displaces.
Something was said to Umut Nayir and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
Nobody at Trabzonspor 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 Trabzonspor, and both men came out saying it was fine.
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.
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.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Batista Mendy signs something — a contract at Trabzonspor or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Trabzonspor, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Nothing in writing and nothing in public: a word about playing time, given face to face at Trabzonspor. The team sheets over the next month will show whether it was worth having.
2 goals in 12 games at Sakaryaspor — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Trabzonspor updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
0‑1 against Slovan Liberec. Continental football is unforgiving about the things a domestic league lets a side get away with, and this was a night spent finding out which of those the club still has.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Trabzonspor this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Trabzonspor can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
Marked 7.12 on 9 actions at both ends of the pitch. Midfielders like this get described as unspectacular by people who have never tried to play against one.
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 Ernest Muçi is on it.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 31 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Fatih Karagumruk will want this one forgotten quickly: 3‑0, every duel lost, and a long ride home. Trabzonspor were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.55 at 34, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Everything was agreed until it was not, and Edin Višća reports back to Trabzonspor with a summer to forget. Neither club is saying who walked away from the table.
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Trabzonspor hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 19 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Position 2, 35 points, and the result everyone checks first is now theirs. The word is still not being said around the ground, which is how you know everyone is thinking it.
Two goals and a mark of 9.28 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Two goals and a mark of 8.32 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
6 straight away victories. Sides that win away are usually sides that can defend and can counter, and the table has begun to reflect what those journeys have earned.
He is 22 and the ground already sings his name, which is a thing that happens to local boys and almost never to signings. Everything from here is measured against an affection he did nothing to earn except be from here.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Trabzonspor will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Samsunspor will want this one forgotten quickly: 4‑1, every duel lost, and a long ride home. Trabzonspor were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.
Two goals and a mark of 8.16 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Trabzonspor, and it is not being withdrawn.
At 34 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.38 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
It is not a grievance and it is not a demand: he wants to play continental football, and he has stopped hiding it. Whether Trabzonspor can give him that is a question about the club, not about him.