“I was told what my role would be, and I signed on that basis. It has not happened.” A grievance with a date attached is the hardest kind to settle.
Squad26 Apr 2027
Words at Excelsior training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Portu 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 upstairs has said anything, which is the loudest thing they could do. Results buy silence in this game; the account at Excelsior is running low.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 7.87 at 34, and nobody on the pitch was better.
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.
8 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
Successful dribbles: 25. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad25 Jan 2027
Words at Excelsior training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Levi Smans 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 not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Excelsior told Kasey Bos something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
Ninety minutes, no goals, and the argument started before the car park emptied: a point gained, or two thrown away against Willem II? Both sides of it will still be going on Thursday.
Nobody at Excelsior 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.