“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 The request is on a desk at Sorrento, and it is not being withdrawn.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sorrento 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. Antonio Amato is living that version at Sorrento, and it tends to show in the first month.
Squad4 Sep 2028
Federico Ricci has improved at 34, which nobody expected
Careers are supposed to plateau and then decline, and the players who ignore that are always the ones who were listening on the training ground. 3 points of it, over months, at an age where the direction normally only goes one way.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Riccardo D'Agostino is 20, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sorrento this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Felipe Álvarez is 23, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Christian Kabasele and Sorrento agree another 2 years.
Ludovico Del Sorbo 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.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 20 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.
Leonardo Capezzi 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.
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.
Nobody at Sorrento 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.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Ludovico Del Sorbo is 23, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Ludovico Del Sorbo 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.
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 Sorrento this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad12 Jun 2028
Words at Sorrento training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Daniele Solcia 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.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Sorrento have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Sorrento is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sorrento this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Ludovico Del Sorbo 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.
Squad15 May 2028
Words at Sorrento training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Daniele Solcia 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.
“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 Sorrento, and it is not being withdrawn.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Sorrento they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sorrento this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Ludovico Del Sorbo has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
17 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Sorrento lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
The terraces17 Apr 2028
The boos come down from three sides
“We pay for this every fortnight. The least we want is somebody who looks like he cares.” 8 of the 31 senior players walked off into it; the rest were not playing.
Ludovico Del Sorbo 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.
8.08. 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.
“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; Sorrento are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Nobody's fault and entirely his: a goal that goes into the book with his name against it and nothing about it intended. Sorrento deserved better, and so did he.
The words a physio says slowly. 25 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.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Sorrento have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Zachary Scerri will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Sorrento the goodbyes have quietly begun.
The words a physio says slowly. 32 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.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Sorrento they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sorrento this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Hard to beat is not the same as winning, but 6 matches without defeat is a foundation Sorrento did not have in the autumn.
Squad3 Apr 2028
Words at Sorrento training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Daniele Solcia 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.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Sorrento know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
The words a physio says slowly. 39 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.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Sorrento have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sorrento this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
47 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Sorrento lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
“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 Sorrento, and it is not being withdrawn.
Ludovico Del Sorbo 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.
Squad20 Mar 2028
Words at Sorrento training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Daniele Solcia 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 8.95 — 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.
61 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Sorrento lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Ian Campbell will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Sorrento the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Ludovico Del Sorbo 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.
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.
75 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Sorrento lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sorrento this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad21 Feb 2028
Words at Sorrento training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Daniele Solcia 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.
91 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Sorrento lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Sorrento have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
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.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Ian Campbell will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Sorrento the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Ludovico Del Sorbo 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.
The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 3 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
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.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 19 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
“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 Sorrento, and it is not being withdrawn.
Ludovico Del Sorbo 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.
The music was off and the showers ran late. What was said in that dressing room stays there, but Saturday will publish the minutes.
Squad24 Jan 2028
Saer Diop 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.
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.
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 Sorrento have had the benefit of 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 Sorrento this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
6 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Sorrento and Latina in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Eugenio D'Ursi signs something — a contract at Sorrento or anywhere else — this column belongs to 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 Sorrento 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sorrento 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.
“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 Sorrento, and it is not being withdrawn.
4 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
Leonardo Capezzi 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.
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 ratings15 Nov 2027
Denis Portanova was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.57. 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.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Sorrento, and both men came out saying it was fine.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sorrento this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
Squad1 Nov 2027
Words at Sorrento training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Saer Diop 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.
11 shots, and a count that reads like a good afternoon until you check the other column. Strikers survive weeks like this on the understanding that the chances keep arriving; the day they stop is the day it becomes a problem.
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. Sorrento know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
The words a physio says slowly. 32 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sorrento 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 watch every Sorrento game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Monopoli runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
47 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Sorrento lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 23 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sorrento this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Careers are supposed to plateau and then decline, and the players who ignore that are always the ones who were listening on the training ground. 3 points of it, over months, at an age where the direction normally only goes one way.
The words a physio says slowly. 62 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.
14 appearances across 8 seasons in one shirt. Nobody builds a career like that on purpose any more; it happens to a certain kind of footballer at a certain kind of club.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Riccardo D'Agostino is 19, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Luca Crecco 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 was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Sorrento has been clear about where Claudio Santini stands, which is more than many ever get.
84 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Sorrento lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Ludovico Del Sorbo is 23, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sorrento this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
91 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Sorrento lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
“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 Sorrento, and it is not being withdrawn.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Mher Kankanyan is 23, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Luca Crecco 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.
8 signings in three months. Every one of them may be an upgrade and the team can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild that never appears in the transfer-window verdicts.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Sorrento know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
The words a physio says slowly. 120 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.
Vincenzo Plescia 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.
The name of Mattia Esposito has come up in conversations Sorrento were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
6 signings in three months. Every one of them may be an upgrade and the team can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild that never appears in the transfer-window verdicts.
Nobody at Sorrento 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.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Sorrento know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Ludovico Del Sorbo is 22, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sorrento this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad14 Jun 2027
Words at Sorrento training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Luca Crecco 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.
The phone has started ringing about Andrea D'Aniello again, and this time the name on the line is Potenza. Sorrento are listening politely and promising nothing.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Sorrento know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Luca Crecco 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.
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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 19-year-old it feels ownership of. Bassidy Sanogo has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
19 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.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Andrea D'Aniello will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Sorrento the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Ludovico Del Sorbo 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.
The unbeaten run reaches 6. Some of them were wins and some were escapes, but a side that refuses to lose is a side other dressing rooms talk about.
Squad10 May 2027
Luca Crecco 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.
The hardest thing about being 20 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Gaël Lafont did not need any: 8.19, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Marco Cuccurullo 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.
Squad19 Apr 2027
Luca Crecco 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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 20-year-old it feels ownership of. Gaël Lafont has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Simon Harrasser is 21, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Squad29 Mar 2027
Getting past Ludovico Del Sorbo has become the hardest job in the division
15 clean sheets and counting. Forwards used to back themselves here; now they shoot early, shoot wide, and look for somebody to blame.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 21 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
Squad29 Mar 2027
Words at Sorrento training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Luca Crecco 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 was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sorrento this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
At 22 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.
Ludovico Del Sorbo 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.
Squad22 Mar 2027
Getting past Ludovico Del Sorbo has become the hardest job in the division
14 clean sheets and counting. Forwards used to back themselves here; now they shoot early, shoot wide, and look for somebody to blame.
Squad22 Mar 2027
Luca Crecco 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sorrento this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 3 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Andrea D'Aniello will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Sorrento the goodbyes have quietly begun.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sorrento this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad15 Feb 2027
Words at Sorrento training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Luca Crecco 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.
A defender's mistake gets tidied up by somebody else; a goalkeeper's ends up in the net. He knew before the ball crossed the line, and so did everybody in the ground.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Leonardo Capezzi signs something — a contract at Sorrento or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Position 3, 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.
“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 Sorrento, and it is not being withdrawn.
He will be fined, he will apologise, and he will play on Saturday. The order of those three tells you everything about what a football club actually values.
25 times he got in the way of something. Centre-halves get written about when they make mistakes and ignored when they do not, so an afternoon like this needs saying out loud: he is the reason the scoreline reads as it does.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sorrento this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The name of Andrea D'Aniello has come up in conversations Sorrento were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Daniele Solcia 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.
Squad25 Jan 2027
Luca Crecco 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.
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
Squad25 Jan 2027
The manager has not finished forgetting Leonardo Capezzi's mistake
Publicly it is behind everybody. It is not behind the man who picks the team, and the only place that shows is a team sheet. He will get another chance; he will get it in a match that matters less.
“We pay for this every fortnight. The least we want is somebody who looks like he cares.” 6 of the 30 senior players walked off into it; the rest were not playing.
Luca Crecco 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.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Leonardo Capezzi signs something — a contract at Sorrento or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Alex Amadio, 18, plays like he has been here for years — 7.99
A mark of 7.99 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 18-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sorrento this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
There is a figure at which a wage bill stops being ambitious and becomes the reason nothing else is possible, and this club has reached it. Nothing is left over for a transfer, a stand or a rainy afternoon.
Squad28 Dec 2026
Getting past Ludovico Del Sorbo has become the hardest job in the division
11 clean sheets and counting. Forwards used to back themselves here; now they shoot early, shoot wide, and look for somebody to blame.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 18 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.
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 Sorrento this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
8.97. 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.
At 22 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.
Marked 8.17 — 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.
Luca Crecco 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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 18-year-old it feels ownership of. Alex Amadio has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Alex Amadio. 1‑0 against Potenza, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
19 times he got in the way of something. Centre-halves get written about when they make mistakes and ignored when they do not, so an afternoon like this needs saying out loud: he is the reason the scoreline reads as it does.
Nobody at Sorrento 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 was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sorrento this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 22-year-old it feels ownership of. Ludovico Del Sorbo has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
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.
12 times he got in the way of something. Centre-halves get written about when they make mistakes and ignored when they do not, so an afternoon like this needs saying out loud: he is the reason the scoreline reads as it does.
Leonardo Capezzi 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.
“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; Sorrento are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Nobody at Sorrento 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.
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.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 20 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sorrento this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
17 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.