Marked for Mario Gargiulo
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
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.
Squad25 Jan 2027
Alfredo Bifulco 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.
Match23 Jan 2027
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Lorenzo Di Livio. 1‑0 against Vis Pesaro, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Player ratings25 Jan 2027
Successful dribbles: 18. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Player ratings25 Jan 2027
Marked 7.84 on an afternoon he ran from the first whistle to the last. Whatever else went wrong, Campobasso had the best player on the pitch.
Boardroom25 Jan 2027
89% of the income goes out in wages at Campobasso
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.
Squad25 Jan 2027
“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
When it matters, Luca Mazzeo plays
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.
Market25 Jan 2027
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Campobasso know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Player ratings18 Jan 2027
Successful dribbles: 39. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Match16 Jan 2027
No end in sight to Campobasso's wait for a win
7 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Campobasso has to find a result from somewhere.
Player ratings18 Jan 2027
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 7.60, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
Squad18 Jan 2027
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Campobasso this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad18 Jan 2027
Matteo Rizzo 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.
Squad18 Jan 2027
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Matteo Rizzo, and the manager let it.
Squad18 Jan 2027
The manager has not finished forgetting Mario Gargiulo'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.
Loan watch18 Jan 2027
14 appearances at Latina and the goals keep coming. Campobasso are watching this more closely than the borrowing club would like.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad11 Jan 2027
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.
Market11 Jan 2027
“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 Campobasso, and it is not being withdrawn.
Match9 Jan 2027
The wait goes on for Campobasso
6 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.
Player ratings11 Jan 2027
Successful dribbles: 22. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad11 Jan 2027
Alfredo Bifulco 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.
Squad11 Jan 2027
Words at Campobasso training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Matteo Rizzo 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 terraces11 Jan 2027
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 22-year-old it feels ownership of. Matteo Rizzo 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.
Squad11 Jan 2027
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Tommy Reid, and the manager let it.
Player ratings11 Jan 2027
A mark of 4.90 tells the story without any need for embellishment. He will want the tape of this one quietly lost.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad21 Dec 2026
A fracture rules Simone Magnaghi out for 41 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Campobasso will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Squad21 Dec 2026
Matteo Rizzo 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 ratings21 Dec 2026
Successful dribbles: 18. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Match19 Dec 2026
Conceding is one thing; the response is what tells you about a dressing room. Alfredo Bifulco had Campobasso level again within 4 minutes, and Ravenna never got to play with a lead at all.
Squad21 Dec 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Claudio Cristallo, and the manager let it.
Player ratings21 Dec 2026
A mark of 7.81, and nobody in the ground would argue with it. He was involved in everything that mattered and most of what did not.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad7 Dec 2026
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 56 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Squad7 Dec 2026
A knee injury of the worst kind for Federico Papini
23 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Campobasso lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Match7 Dec 2026
Every point is an argument now for Campobasso
Position 17 and 12 points, and the table gets read bottom-up in this part of town. The calendar has stopped being a schedule and started being a countdown.
Market7 Dec 2026
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Campobasso can pretend not to have heard.
Squad7 Dec 2026
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Campobasso this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad7 Dec 2026
Matteo Rizzo 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.
Match5 Dec 2026
1‑2 to Pontedera, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
Player ratings7 Dec 2026
Successful dribbles: 11. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Loan watch7 Dec 2026
The goals keep arriving from Riccardo Forte’s exile
3 goals in 15 games at Trapani — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Campobasso updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad2 Nov 2026
Federico Papini damages knee ligaments — 61 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 61 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.
Market2 Nov 2026
“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 Campobasso, and it is not being withdrawn.
Match31 Oct 2026
Guidonia Montecelio left with the points after a 1‑2 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Squad2 Nov 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.
Boardroom2 Nov 2026
Wages eat 116% of everything Campobasso earn
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.
Squad2 Nov 2026
Too much change too quickly at Campobasso
5 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.
Squad2 Nov 2026
Andrea Lombari named in the team of the month
A month is long enough that nobody gets in by accident. Andrea Lombari is in the division's best eleven for it, which is a quieter compliment than an award and a more reliable one.
Player ratings2 Nov 2026
Successful dribbles: 14. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Loan watch2 Nov 2026
9 appearances at Latina and the goals keep coming. Campobasso are watching this more closely than the borrowing club would like.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad12 Oct 2026
Federico Papini damages knee ligaments — 82 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 82 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.
Player ratings12 Oct 2026
Successful dribbles: 31. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad12 Oct 2026
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Matteo Rizzo is 22, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Squad12 Oct 2026
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Campobasso this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Match10 Oct 2026
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Francesco Cerretelli. 2‑1 against Livorno, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Squad12 Oct 2026
The manager has not finished forgetting Mario Gargiulo'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.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad5 Oct 2026
A knee injury of the worst kind for Federico Papini
90 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Campobasso lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Match3 Oct 2026
The wait goes on for Campobasso
7 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.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Alfredo Bifulco 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.
Player ratings5 Oct 2026
Successful dribbles: 21. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Words at Campobasso training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Matteo Rizzo 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.
Boardroom5 Oct 2026
143% of the income goes out in wages at Campobasso
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.
Squad5 Oct 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Roberto Pierno, and the manager let it.
Match3 Oct 2026
Campobasso hit back inside 2 minutes
Torres held the lead for 2 minutes, which is not long enough to enjoy it. Campobasso answered before the celebration had properly finished, and the shape of the afternoon changed with it.
Match3 Oct 2026
It needed Antonio Gala to find the net to bring anything home at all: 1‑1 against Torres, and half the dressing room will call it a point won.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad14 Sep 2026
A knee injury of the worst kind for Federico Papini
113 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Campobasso lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Player ratings14 Sep 2026
Successful dribbles: 21. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Matteo Rizzo 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
Crisis
Squad31 Aug 2026
A knee injury of the worst kind for Federico Papini
127 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Campobasso lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Squad31 Aug 2026
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Campobasso this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Match29 Aug 2026
2‑3 to Carpi, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad3 Aug 2026
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Mario Gargiulo commits to Campobasso for another 3 years.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Alfredo Bifulco 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.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Words at Campobasso training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Matteo Rizzo 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.