Marked for Davide Petermann
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Player ratings25 Jan 2027
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 9.12, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
Market25 Jan 2027
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
The dugout25 Jan 2027
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Foggia may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Squad25 Jan 2027
34 days, the scan says, and scans are kinder than reality. The fixtures in that window have just become somebody else’s job.
Squad25 Jan 2027
A season average of 7.21 with 14 goals behind it. Opponents have started planning around him, which is the sincerest compliment football pays.
Transfer targets25 Jan 2027
The approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.
Match23 Jan 2027
A 2‑0 win over Siracusa, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Squad25 Jan 2027
200 games in this shirt, through managers and relegations and everything else. Service like it is disappearing from the game and the crowd knows what it is watching.
Boardroom25 Jan 2027
93% of the income goes out in wages at Foggia
Every club in football pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time somebody has tried it.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Player ratings18 Jan 2027
A brace, and Giuseppe Panico takes the afternoon — 8.95
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Giuseppe Panico provided it, and the 8.95 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Squad18 Jan 2027
7 saves, and a scoreline the ten men in front of him had no right to. Goalkeepers only get noticed on the bad days; this was one of the other ones.
Transfer targets18 Jan 2027
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: Ujpest keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
Transfer targets18 Jan 2027
Foggia asked and Bologna said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Match16 Jan 2027
Audace Cerignola made Foggia work for it, but the scoreboard read 2‑1 at the end and the table does not ask how.
Match16 Jan 2027
The run at home goes on for Foggia
8 matches unbeaten here. Every visiting manager is asked about it in the week before, which is precisely why it keeps going.
Squad18 Jan 2027
A falling-out at Foggia
Davide Petermann and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Transfer targets18 Jan 2027
A loan enquiry to Como: cover, or a look at somebody the club cannot afford to buy yet. Either way the answer will come back inside the week.
Transfer targets18 Jan 2027
A loan enquiry to Udinese: cover, or a look at somebody the club cannot afford to buy yet. Either way the answer will come back inside the week.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Market14 Dec 2026
Only the photograph left for Marco Oliva
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Marco Oliva will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Foggia the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Match12 Dec 2026
It finished 2‑0, and it was Giuseppe Panico’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Foggia.
Player ratings14 Dec 2026
Ninety minutes of Giuseppe Panico at his very best
Marked 8.20. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Foggia.
Player ratings14 Dec 2026
Gianmarco Cangiano was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.22. 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.
The dugout14 Dec 2026
The manager’s verdict
“I am not going to get carried away and I will not let them either. It was a good day. There will be harder ones.” Paolo Rossi kept it short after the 2‑0 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.
The dugout14 Dec 2026
“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.
The dugout14 Dec 2026
Gianluca Saro gets picked when it counts
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 Gianluca Saro is on it.
Player ratings14 Dec 2026
Defensive actions: 14, and a clean sheet at the end of it. A centre-half's best afternoons look like nothing happening, which is precisely the point.
Looking ahead14 Dec 2026
Trapani next, and one man in the Foggia dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought of him.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match28 Nov 2026
3‑0, and the margin flattered nobody — it could have carried another goal or two without complaint. Afternoons like this are why people keep coming.
Squad30 Nov 2026
3 goals in one game. The first was taken well, the second was taken greedily, and by the third the crowd were simply waiting for him to get the ball.
Player ratings30 Nov 2026
A midfielder is measured on whether the team functions when he is on the pitch, which is nearly impossible to see and completely obvious in retrospect. 17 actions, 7.49, and a manager who will not be substituting him again in a hurry.
Player ratings30 Nov 2026
Giuseppe Panico was on a different afternoon to everybody else
9.62. 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.
Match28 Nov 2026
6 unbeaten for Foggia
Hard to beat is not the same as winning, but 6 matches without defeat is a foundation Foggia did not have in the autumn.
Boardroom30 Nov 2026
122% of the income goes out in wages at Foggia
Every club in football pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time somebody has tried it.
Squad30 Nov 2026
Words exchanged at Foggia
Davide Petermann 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.
Squad30 Nov 2026
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Filippo Perucchini and Foggia agree another 1 years.
Squad30 Nov 2026
Gianmarco Todisco 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.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Player ratings26 Oct 2026
Successful dribbles: 24. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad26 Oct 2026
Giuseppe Panico 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.
Match24 Oct 2026
Cosenza left with the points after a 0‑1 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Squad26 Oct 2026
Too much change too quickly at Foggia
13 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.
The dugout26 Oct 2026
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 Paolo Rossi left the room before anybody could ask which.
The dugout26 Oct 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Davide Petermann, and the manager let it.
Looking ahead26 Oct 2026
Altamura next, and one man in the Foggia dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought of him.
Market26 Oct 2026
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Giuseppe Panico signs something — a contract at Foggia or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
The dugout26 Oct 2026
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.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match3 Oct 2026
Beaten 1‑2, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Boardroom5 Oct 2026
Wages swallow 158% of the Foggia income
Every club pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time it has been tried.
The dugout5 Oct 2026
The manager makes an example of Gianluca Saro
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Words exchanged at Foggia
Davide Petermann 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.
Squad5 Oct 2026
“The easiest signature of my career.” Filippo Perucchini and Foggia agree another 1 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
The dugout5 Oct 2026
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 1‑2, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Mohamed Seck makes the team of the month
Four or five weekends of consistency, measured against everybody else in the division. A quieter compliment than an award and a more reliable one.
Market5 Oct 2026
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Foggia, another week without a signature from Mamadou Coulibaly.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Nothing is announced when this happens and everybody knows. He is a bigger part of the plan at Foggia than he was a month ago, and the training ground worked that out before the team sheet said so.