Marked for Facundo Lescano
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match1 May 2028
Salernitana are in among the leaders
Position 3 and 49 points on the board. Nobody at the ground will say the word out loud yet, and everybody at the ground is thinking it.
Squad1 May 2028
The kind of year that ends with a name being read out in a hall. Salernitana had the benefit of it every week and now have the problem of everybody else knowing.
Market1 May 2028
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Salernitana can pretend not to have heard.
Squad1 May 2028
Kees de Boer and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
The dugout1 May 2028
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Franco Ferrari, and the manager let it.
Squad1 May 2028
Samuele Mancini 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.
Squad1 May 2028
A year in and the city has not opened up, the language has not come, and lunch is eaten alone more often than anybody at Salernitana would admit. It shows on Saturdays.
Market1 May 2028
“There is a gap, and pretending there is not helps nobody.” Neither side has moved, and the calendar is working for exactly one of them.
The dugout1 May 2028
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Alisson Cassiano trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match17 Apr 2028
The season ends: position 3 for Salernitana
The last league game has been played and the table has stopped moving: 49 points. The summer begins on Monday, and so does the argument about what it all meant.
Match15 Apr 2028
Every run ends on an afternoon somebody had marked down as routine. This one went 14 matches, which is long enough that a town had stopped counting, and short enough that it will remember exactly who stopped it.
The dugout17 Apr 2028
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Salernitana may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Match15 Apr 2028
Potenza left with the points after a 0‑2 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
The dugout17 Apr 2028
Mikel Santos gets it from the manager
“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.
Squad17 Apr 2028
Ettore Quirini 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 dugout17 Apr 2028
“I could talk about decisions and I could talk about luck. I will not. We lost.” The manager, 0‑2, and a press conference that lasted four minutes.
Squad17 Apr 2028
Erisotel Koleci 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 ratings17 Apr 2028
Successful dribbles: 15. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Match8 Apr 2028
Hard to beat is not the same as winning, but 14 matches without defeat is a foundation Salernitana did not have in the autumn.
The dugout10 Apr 2028
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Salernitana may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Player ratings10 Apr 2028
Successful dribbles: 23. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad10 Apr 2028
“The easiest signature of my career.” Antonio Pio Iervolino and Salernitana agree another 3 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Squad10 Apr 2028
Ettore Quirini 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.
Squad10 Apr 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Salernitana this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Player ratings10 Apr 2028
Marked 7.42 on an afternoon he ran from the first whistle to the last. Whatever else went wrong, Salernitana had the best player on the pitch.
The dugout10 Apr 2028
A player who expected to start watched it instead. The manager will call it a decision for the team; Ettore Quirini will call it something else in private.
The dugout10 Apr 2028
Somebody else has been better, the manager has said so with a team sheet, and there is no argument to be had. He will get the shirt back the only way it can be got back.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Match1 Apr 2028
3‑0, and Facundo Lescano took the headlines on an afternoon when everything Salernitana tried came off. Days like this are retold all winter.
Match1 Apr 2028
Hard to beat is not the same as winning, but 13 matches without defeat is a foundation Salernitana did not have in the autumn.
Player ratings3 Apr 2028
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 8.92, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
Match3 Apr 2028
Salernitana are in among the leaders
Position 3 and 48 points on the board. Nobody at the ground will say the word out loud yet, and everybody at the ground is thinking it.
Squad3 Apr 2028
A season average of 7.27 with 22 goals behind it. Opponents have started planning around him, which is the sincerest compliment football pays.
The dugout3 Apr 2028
The team sheet said everything about Antonio Donnarumma
Warm-up bib, ninety minutes of watching, and a handshake at the end that fooled nobody. Big matches tell you who a manager trusts; this one told Antonio Donnarumma.
Squad3 Apr 2028
Erisotel Koleci and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
The dugout3 Apr 2028
There is no complaint available here and everybody involved knows it, which does not make the walk to the bench any shorter. Form is the only currency in football that cannot be borrowed against.
Squad3 Apr 2028
Mattia Vitale named in the team of the month
A month is long enough that nobody gets in by accident. Mattia Vitale is in the division's best eleven for it, which is a quieter compliment than an award and a more reliable one.
In brief
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The dugout
The manager’s verdict
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The dugout
Alisson Cassiano gets it from the manager
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Squad
Words at Salernitana training over how hard people work
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Match18 Mar 2028
Whatever happens, Salernitana do not lose
12 games unbeaten now. Some were earned and some were survived, but a habit is forming — and habits are the hardest thing in football to play against.
Squad20 Mar 2028
20 goals and a season average of 7.23. Form like that gets noticed well beyond this town.
Match18 Mar 2028
Three points for Salernitana, 2‑1 the final word against Casertana in a contest settled by the finer margins.
Squad20 Mar 2028
Nino Gotsiridze 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.
Market20 Mar 2028
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Alisson Cassiano has his answer from Salernitana; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
The dugout20 Mar 2028
Somebody else is better right now than Antonio Donnarumma
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.
The dugout20 Mar 2028
“That is what I want every week. Not the result, the way they went about it.” The manager, after 2‑1, already talking about the next one.
The dugout20 Mar 2028
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Daniele Celiento, and the manager let it.
The dugout20 Mar 2028
“I would rather say it to his face than read about it.” The meeting was requested by the player, which tells you most of what you need to know.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Player ratings28 Feb 2028
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 8.93, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
Match26 Feb 2028
Whatever happens, Salernitana do not lose
9 games unbeaten now. Some were earned and some were survived, but a habit is forming — and habits are the hardest thing in football to play against.
Squad28 Feb 2028
A season average of 7.23 with 19 goals behind it. Opponents have started planning around him, which is the sincerest compliment football pays.
Market28 Feb 2028
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Salernitana is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Match26 Feb 2028
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Facundo Lescano. 2‑1 against Monopoli, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Market28 Feb 2028
Eugenio D'Ursi is free to find somewhere else
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Salernitana has been clear about where Eugenio D'Ursi stands, which is more than many ever get.
The dugout28 Feb 2028
The manager makes an example of Eugenio D'Ursi
“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.
The dugout28 Feb 2028
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Salernitana told Eugenio D'Ursi something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
Squad28 Feb 2028
Erisotel Koleci 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.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Market31 Jan 2028
“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 Salernitana, and it is not being withdrawn.
Market31 Jan 2028
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Salernitana is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Transfer targets31 Jan 2028
Everything agreed with Cagliari, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
Transfer targets31 Jan 2028
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: LOSC Lille keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
Squad31 Jan 2028
17 goals and a season average of 7.22. Form like that gets noticed well beyond this town.
Transfer targets31 Jan 2028
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.
Match29 Jan 2028
Every run ends on an afternoon somebody had marked down as routine. This one went 4 matches, which is long enough that a town had stopped counting, and short enough that it will remember exactly who stopped it.
The dugout31 Jan 2028
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Mikel Santos, and the manager let it.
Squad31 Jan 2028
Matei Topa and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Transfer targets24 Jan 2028
The clubs have shaken hands with Como; the player has not yet. Personal terms are next, and personal terms are where more deals die than anybody prints.
Market24 Jan 2028
“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.
Squad24 Jan 2028
A fracture rules Massimo Alberti out for 19 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Salernitana will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Player ratings24 Jan 2028
Two goals and a mark of 8.71 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Market24 Jan 2028
The bid was some way short and Salernitana did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Match22 Jan 2028
Nobody wants to play Salernitana right now
4 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.
Squad24 Jan 2028
Kees de Boer 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.
Squad24 Jan 2028
Defences have started doubling up on Facundo Lescano
16 goals and a season average of 7.20 will do that. The space he used to find has gone; he keeps scoring anyway, which is the mark of the real thing.
Transfer targets24 Jan 2028
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Juve Stabia have kept their man, and Salernitana go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad17 Jan 2028
A fracture rules Massimo Alberti out for 27 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Salernitana will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Market17 Jan 2028
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Salernitana have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Market17 Jan 2028
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Salernitana can pretend not to have heard.
Match15 Jan 2028
3 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.
Squad17 Jan 2028
Paolo Ghiglione and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Transfer targets17 Jan 2028
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.
Match15 Jan 2028
A 2‑1 win over Cavese, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Player ratings17 Jan 2028
A mark of 7.98, and nobody in the ground would argue with it. He was involved in everything that mattered and most of what did not.
Transfer targets17 Jan 2028
A loan enquiry to Cremonese: 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
Steady
Match8 Jan 2028
Sorrento will want this one forgotten quickly: 3‑0, every duel lost, and a long ride home. Salernitana were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.
Market10 Jan 2028
“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 Salernitana, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad10 Jan 2028
35 days out for Massimo Alberti after a fracture
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Salernitana will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Player ratings10 Jan 2028
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 8.99, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
Transfer targets10 Jan 2028
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.
The dugout10 Jan 2028
“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.
Squad10 Jan 2028
Erisotel Koleci and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Transfer targets10 Jan 2028
Como have been asked whether they would lend him. Loans are agreed quickly or not at all, and this one will be one or the other by the weekend.
The dugout10 Jan 2028
There is no complaint available here and everybody involved knows it, which does not make the walk to the bench any shorter. Form is the only currency in football that cannot be borrowed against.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market3 Jan 2028
“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.
Player ratings3 Jan 2028
A brace, and Facundo Lescano takes the afternoon — 8.96
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Facundo Lescano provided it, and the 8.96 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Transfer targets3 Jan 2028
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.
Market3 Jan 2028
Luca Villa told to find a new club
“They were honest with me, and I would rather know.” Luca Villa has been informed he is not in the manager's thinking at Salernitana.
Match1 Jan 2028
It finished 2‑0, and it was Facundo Lescano’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Salernitana.
Match1 Jan 2028
It had gone 5 games. The players did not celebrate like men who had won a match; they celebrated like men who had been let out of something.
The dugout3 Jan 2028
The manager makes an example of Mikel Santos
“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.
Squad3 Jan 2028
Matei Topa 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.
Squad3 Jan 2028
Somebody has moved past him. It is not a dropping and it is worse than one, because a dropping is about a Saturday and this is about where he stands.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad27 Dec 2027
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Salernitana will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Match25 Dec 2027
5 matches without a win for Salernitana
The run now stands at 5, and the questions being asked around Salernitana are no longer polite ones.
The dugout27 Dec 2027
“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.
Match25 Dec 2027
1‑3 to Potenza, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
The dugout27 Dec 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.
Match27 Dec 2027
Halfway: Salernitana sit in position 12
17 points at the turn. The first half of a season is a promise; the second is a bill, and the town is about to find out which of the two this one was.
The dugout27 Dec 2027
Clubs make promises constantly and the page usually only hears about them when they are broken. This one was honoured, and the dressing room noticed that faster than any supporter did.
The dugout27 Dec 2027
“I could talk about decisions and I could talk about luck. I will not. We lost.” The manager, 1‑3, and a press conference that lasted four minutes.
Squad27 Dec 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 Salernitana this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad20 Dec 2027
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Salernitana will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Match18 Dec 2027
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.
Player ratings20 Dec 2027
Successful dribbles: 23. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
The dugout20 Dec 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.
Squad20 Dec 2027
Matei Topa in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Salernitana this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The dugout20 Dec 2027
There is no complaint available here and everybody involved knows it, which does not make the walk to the bench any shorter. Form is the only currency in football that cannot be borrowed against.
The dugout20 Dec 2027
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Salernitana told Antonio Pio Iervolino something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
Match18 Dec 2027
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 manager’s verdict
“I am frustrated, honestly. We did enough to win and we did not win.” Cristiano Ferri was not hiding it after 1‑1, and nobody in the Salernitana dressing room was either.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad22 Nov 2027
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Salernitana will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Match20 Nov 2027
It finished 2‑1, and it was Facundo Lescano’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Salernitana.
Player ratings22 Nov 2027
Ninety minutes of Mattia Vitale at his very best
Marked 8.03. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Salernitana.
Squad22 Nov 2027
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” William Abbriano and Salernitana agree another 3 years.
Squad22 Nov 2027
Gabriele Milone 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 dugout22 Nov 2027
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Salernitana told Mikel Santos something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
The dugout22 Nov 2027
There is no complaint available here and everybody involved knows it, which does not make the walk to the bench any shorter. Form is the only currency in football that cannot be borrowed against.
The dugout22 Nov 2027
“That is what I want every week. Not the result, the way they went about it.” The manager, after 2‑1, already talking about the next one.
The dugout22 Nov 2027
Mikel Santos knocks on the manager's door
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Salernitana, and both men came out saying it was fine.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad15 Nov 2027
William Abbriano 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 dugout15 Nov 2027
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Salernitana told Paolo Ghiglione something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
The dugout15 Nov 2027
Nobody will confirm this and nothing else explains the last month of selections. A costly error buys a player a period of being second choice that is always longer than the error was.
Squad15 Nov 2027
Words at Salernitana training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Gabriele Milone 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.
Boardroom15 Nov 2027
85% of the income goes out in wages at Salernitana
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.
The dugout15 Nov 2027
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Tayson Franquet, and the manager let it.
The dugout15 Nov 2027
Mikel Santos knocks on the manager's door
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Salernitana, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Squad15 Nov 2027
The division's best last weekend was a Salernitana man
It is a small honour and it is not nothing: somebody watched every match in the division and decided that Facundo Lescano was the best thing in any of them.
Squad15 Nov 2027
The system has changed and his position has not. A footballer can improve his form; he cannot improve the manager’s formation, and that is the whole of the problem.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Match3 Nov 2027
Como ended it 0‑4. The season narrows to the league now, and everyone in the ground knew it before the final whistle.
Squad8 Nov 2027
The match ball belongs to Facundo Lescano, whose 3 goals turned a difficult afternoon into a procession.
The terraces8 Nov 2027
A cup embarrassment at Como follows Salernitana home
0-4. Going out of a cup is one afternoon; going out like that is a week of phone-ins, and the manager will hear every one of them.
Match6 Nov 2027
It had gone 7 games. The players did not celebrate like men who had won a match; they celebrated like men who had been let out of something.
Squad8 Nov 2027
Erisotel Koleci gets the move he always wanted
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Erisotel Koleci has just signed for Salernitana, and for once the answer mattered.
Player ratings8 Nov 2027
A performance of 9.57 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
Match6 Nov 2027
It finished 3‑2, and it was Facundo Lescano’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Salernitana.
The dugout8 Nov 2027
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Antonio Donnarumma, and the manager let it.
Match6 Nov 2027
2 goals inside twenty minutes with Facundo Lescano in the middle of it, and Monopoli unable to get near the ball long enough to change anything. Some matches are won before the first drink.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad11 Oct 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 Salernitana this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad11 Oct 2027
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Tayson Franquet commits to Salernitana for another 3 years.
The dugout11 Oct 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.
Looking ahead11 Oct 2027
Foggia next, and one man in the Salernitana dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought of him.
The dugout11 Oct 2027
A conversation in the manager’s office, and a commitment that came out of it. Promises like that are cheap to make and expensive to break, and Paolo Ghiglione has written the date down.
The dugout11 Oct 2027
Franco Ferrari knocks on the manager’s door
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Franco Ferrari trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Squad11 Oct 2027
A season on the outside for Rodrigo Moura
He trains hard, says the right things and goes home to an empty flat. Nobody at Salernitana has done anything wrong, which is exactly what makes it so difficult to fix.
Squad11 Oct 2027
“I want to stay in the game when I stop, and I am not going to wait until I stop to prepare for it.” At 31 the badges have begun, and every manager in the division remembers doing the same.
Looking ahead11 Oct 2027
Next up at home: Foggia, who go into it in position 3. The kind of fixture a season is quietly built on or quietly loses its shape in.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad4 Oct 2027
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Marco Capuano commits to Salernitana for another 2 years.
The dugout4 Oct 2027
Mikel Santos gets it from the manager
“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.
Market4 Oct 2027
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Salernitana, another week without a signature from Antonio Donnarumma.
The dugout4 Oct 2027
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Salernitana told Paolo Ghiglione something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
Player ratings4 Oct 2027
Some games turn on a moment; this one turned on a man. 7.68 on the card, and the Salernitana support went home talking about one name.
Squad4 Oct 2027
Facundo Lescano named in the team of the month
A month is long enough that nobody gets in by accident. Facundo Lescano is in the division's best eleven for it, which is a quieter compliment than an award and a more reliable one.
Squad4 Oct 2027
The captaincy has been taken off Luca Villa. Salernitana will call it a decision about the team; a dressing room reads it as a verdict on a man.
The dugout4 Oct 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.” Cristiano Ferri chose the glass-half-full version of 0‑0; the supporters left with the other one.
Squad4 Oct 2027
Mikel Santos moves up the pecking order
Nothing is announced when this happens and everybody knows. He is a bigger part of the plan at Salernitana than he was a month ago, and the training ground worked that out before the team sheet said so.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Player ratings20 Sep 2027
Successful dribbles: 22. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
Match18 Sep 2027
1‑2 to Cavese, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
The dugout20 Sep 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.
Squad20 Sep 2027
200 games in the shirt. Nobody sets out to build a record like that; it happens to a certain kind of player at a certain kind of club, and this town knows what it has.
Squad20 Sep 2027
7 new faces, and Salernitana are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
Player ratings20 Sep 2027
Marked 7.70 on an afternoon he ran from the first whistle to the last. Whatever else went wrong, Salernitana had the best player on the pitch.
The dugout20 Sep 2027
The view from the dugout
“We will look at it, we will learn from it, and we go again.” The three sentences every manager keeps for a 1‑2 defeat, delivered by Cristiano Ferri to a room that had heard them before.
Market20 Sep 2027
Salernitana have made Kees de Boer available for transfer. A career at this club is over in all but paperwork.
Squad20 Sep 2027
The division's best last weekend was a Salernitana man
It is a small honour and it is not nothing: somebody watched every match in the division and decided that Facundo Lescano was the best thing in any of them.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad13 Sep 2027
14 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Salernitana lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Squad13 Sep 2027
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.
The dugout13 Sep 2027
Eugenio D'Ursi: that is not what I was promised
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Salernitana have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Match11 Sep 2027
3 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.
Squad13 Sep 2027
Kees de Boer and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Player ratings13 Sep 2027
Facundo Lescano was on a different afternoon to everybody else
9.52. 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.
Match11 Sep 2027
Sorrento made Salernitana work for it, but the scoreboard read 3‑2 at the end and the table does not ask how.
Transfer targets13 Sep 2027
The clock did what Picerno would not, and ended it. Supporters who watched the countdown will spend the next window doing it again.
The dugout13 Sep 2027
“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.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad30 Aug 2027
29 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Salernitana lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Transfer targets30 Aug 2027
The clubs have shaken hands with Gubbio; the player has not yet. Personal terms are next, and personal terms are where more deals die than anybody prints.
The dugout30 Aug 2027
This is not rotation. Ismail Achik has not been in the manager's plans for some time, and nobody at Salernitana is pretending otherwise.
The dugout30 Aug 2027
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Salernitana may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Squad30 Aug 2027
Kees de Boer 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.
Transfer targets30 Aug 2027
$290.0K was the most the club would pay and Forli were asking for more. Deals like this are revived in the last week of a window roughly half the time, and everybody involved knows it.
Transfer targets30 Aug 2027
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Mantova have kept their man, and Salernitana go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Match28 Aug 2027
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Eugenio D'Ursi. 2‑1 against Audace Cerignola, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
The dugout30 Aug 2027
The manager makes an example of Facundo Lescano
“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.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
The dugout5 Jul 2027
This is not rotation. Ismail Achik has not been in the manager's plans for some time, and nobody at Salernitana is pretending otherwise.
Squad5 Jul 2027
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and Salernitana know it.
Squad5 Jul 2027
Paolo Ghiglione 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.
Transfer targets5 Jul 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.
The dugout5 Jul 2027
The manager makes an example of Kees de Boer
“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.
Market5 Jul 2027
29 games, 12 goals, and a squad option that has arrived without a fee attached. The interesting question at Salernitana now is not whether he plays but who he displaces.
Squad5 Jul 2027
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Gianluca Longobardi commits to Salernitana for another 3 years.
Squad5 Jul 2027
29 days, the medical staff say, and medical staff are optimists by profession. The team sheet will look wrong without him.
Transfer targets5 Jul 2027
A loan enquiry to Catania: 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
Uneasy
Market14 Jun 2027
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Salernitana have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Market14 Jun 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.
Transfer targets14 Jun 2027
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Udinese have kept their man, and Salernitana go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Squad14 Jun 2027
Simone Pieraccini 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.
Loan watch14 Jun 2027
29 appearances away from home and 12 goals to show for them. Every one of them makes next summer's conversation a little more expensive.
Transfer targets14 Jun 2027
A loan enquiry to Hellas Verona: cover, or a look at somebody the club cannot afford to buy yet. Either way the answer will come back inside the week.
Transfer targets14 Jun 2027
A loan enquiry to Catania: cover, or a look at somebody the club cannot afford to buy yet. Either way the answer will come back inside the week.
The dugout14 Jun 2027
Nobody will confirm this and nothing else explains the last month of selections. A costly error buys a player a period of being second choice that is always longer than the error was.
The dugout14 Jun 2027
“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.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market17 May 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.
Squad17 May 2027
Þórir Jóhann Helgason 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.
Market17 May 2027
No place for Kees de Boer in the plan
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Kees de Boer has his answer from Salernitana; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
Loan watch17 May 2027
29 appearances away from home and 12 goals to show for them. Every one of them makes next summer's conversation a little more expensive.
Squad17 May 2027
Simone Pieraccini 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 dugout17 May 2027
Kees de Boer knocks on the manager’s door
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Kees de Boer trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
The dugout17 May 2027
Jonas Heinz gets it from the manager
“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.
Squad17 May 2027
“I did not sign to watch. Nobody does.” The oldest complaint in the game, and Salernitana will have to answer it with minutes or with a move.
Squad17 May 2027
A year in and the language has not come, the city has not opened up, and he eats alone more often than anybody at Salernitana would like to admit. It is showing on Saturdays.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market19 Apr 2027
Kees de Boer hands in a written request
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Salernitana can pretend not to have heard.
Match19 Apr 2027
41 points, and the season has a number on it. Whatever it felt like from the inside, this is what it will look like in a book.
Squad19 Apr 2027
Luca Villa 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.
Match17 Apr 2027
It had gone 6 games. The players did not celebrate like men who had won a match; they celebrated like men who had been let out of something.
The dugout19 Apr 2027
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Filippo Romagna, and the manager let it.
Match17 Apr 2027
A 1‑0 win over Picerno, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Player ratings19 Apr 2027
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.14, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
Loan watch19 Apr 2027
29 appearances away from home and 12 goals to show for them. Every one of them makes next summer's conversation a little more expensive.
Squad19 Apr 2027
Simone Pieraccini 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
Match3 Apr 2027
5 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 Apr 2027
Kees de Boer 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.
Squad5 Apr 2027
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Þórir Jóhann Helgason was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout5 Apr 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.
Match3 Apr 2027
Beaten 0‑1, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
The dugout5 Apr 2027
Something was said to Þórir Jóhann Helgason and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
The dugout5 Apr 2027
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 0‑1, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
The dugout5 Apr 2027
No place for Marco Capuano on the big day
He found out with everybody else, an hour before kick-off, from a sheet of paper on a wall. Nobody at Salernitana pretended it was anything other than a decision about him.
Squad5 Apr 2027
Salernitana will explain it as a decision about the team, and it may well be one. A dressing room has never once read it that way.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Market22 Mar 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 Salernitana, and it is not being withdrawn.
Match20 Mar 2027
No end in sight to Salernitana's wait for a win
4 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Salernitana has to find a result from somewhere.
Squad22 Mar 2027
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and Salernitana know it.
Squad22 Mar 2027
Luka Stojković 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.
Squad22 Mar 2027
Words at Salernitana training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Þórir Jóhann Helgason 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.
Match20 Mar 2027
Bari left with the points after a 0‑2 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Loan watch22 Mar 2027
27 appearances away from home and 12 goals to show for them. Every one of them makes next summer's conversation a little more expensive.
The dugout22 Mar 2027
A player who expected to start watched it instead. The manager will call it a decision for the team; Filippo Romagna will call it something else in private.
The dugout22 Mar 2027
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Cristiano Ferri after 0‑2, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Player ratings22 Feb 2027
Two goals and a mark of 9.21 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Match20 Feb 2027
The 86th minute, half the ground already edging towards the exits, and Andrea Ferraris decided nobody was going anywhere. Audace Cerignola had no time left to answer.
Match20 Feb 2027
It finished 3‑2, and it was Andrea Ferraris’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Salernitana.
Squad22 Feb 2027
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 terraces22 Feb 2027
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 22-year-old it feels ownership of. Simone Pieraccini 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 dugout22 Feb 2027
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Antonio Donnarumma, and the manager let it.
Loan watch22 Feb 2027
23 appearances at Salernitana and the goals keep coming. Salernitana are watching this more closely than the borrowing club would like.
Squad22 Feb 2027
Daniele Celiento 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.
Squad22 Feb 2027
Goalkeepers do not get to make mistakes; they get to make goals. He made one, he knew it instantly, and there was nobody behind him to make it anything else.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Player ratings8 Feb 2027
A brace, and Facundo Lescano takes the afternoon — 8.97
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Facundo Lescano provided it, and the 8.97 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Market8 Feb 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 dugout8 Feb 2027
“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.
Squad8 Feb 2027
Kees de Boer 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.
Squad8 Feb 2027
Words at Salernitana training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Þórir Jóhann Helgason 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.
Transfer targets8 Feb 2027
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Fiorentina have kept their man, and Salernitana go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Squad8 Feb 2027
The medical room confirms 40 days on the sidelines for Filippo Romagna, and a plan built around him now has to be rebuilt.
Match6 Feb 2027
Late, late show earns Salernitana a point
Minute 91, against Casarano, 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.
Loan watch8 Feb 2027
The goals keep arriving from Facundo Lescano’s exile
11 goals in 21 games at Salernitana — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Salernitana updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Match16 Jan 2027
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.
Transfer targets18 Jan 2027
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: Hellas Verona keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
Player ratings18 Jan 2027
16 combined actions and 7.07. 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.
Squad18 Jan 2027
Kees de Boer 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.
Market18 Jan 2027
The name of Juan Ignacio Molina has come up in conversations Salernitana were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
The terraces18 Jan 2027
He is 23 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.
Player ratings18 Jan 2027
A performance of 8.26 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
The dugout18 Jan 2027
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Ismail Achik, and the manager let it.
Squad18 Jan 2027
24 days, the scan says, and scans are kinder than reality. The fixtures in that window have just become somebody else’s job.
In brief
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Transfer targets
A loan move for Filippo Romagna is in the works
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The dugout
The view from the dugout
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Loan watch
The goals keep arriving from Facundo Lescano’s exile
From our football correspondent
Steady
The dugout11 Jan 2027
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Salernitana may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Transfer targets11 Jan 2027
The deal with Palermo is done in every sense but the one that puts him on the pitch. Nothing goes wrong at this stage, except on the occasions when it does.
Transfer targets11 Jan 2027
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: Panathinaikos keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
Squad11 Jan 2027
Luca Villa and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Transfer targets11 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.
Match9 Jan 2027
Crotone left with the points after a 0‑1 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
The dugout11 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.
Squad11 Jan 2027
Words at Salernitana training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Simone Pieraccini 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 dugout11 Jan 2027
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 0‑1, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Market4 Jan 2027
Ismail Achik hands in a written request
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Salernitana can pretend not to have heard.
Player ratings4 Jan 2027
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 8.25, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
Squad4 Jan 2027
The kind of year that ends with a name being read out in a hall. Salernitana had the benefit of it every week and now have the problem of everybody else knowing.
Market4 Jan 2027
The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.
Transfer targets4 Jan 2027
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Salernitana have done the hard part with Panathinaikos, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
Match2 Jan 2027
Three points for Salernitana, 3‑2 the final word against Monopoli in a contest settled by the finer margins.
Squad4 Jan 2027
“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; Salernitana are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Transfer targets4 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.
Squad4 Jan 2027
Armando Anastasio 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.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match26 Dec 2026
Rarely has this fixture seen a display like it: 3‑0 against Picerno, and it could have been more.
Player ratings28 Dec 2026
Up for the corner, and Kees de Boer delivers — 7.74
Centre-halves are allowed forward twice a season and are judged on what they do when they get there. Kees de Boer scored, was marked 7.74, and got back before anybody noticed he had gone.
Squad28 Dec 2026
Kees de Boer and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad28 Dec 2026
At 18 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.
Match28 Dec 2026
Half the programme played, position 6, 23 on the board. Doubling it is the sum every supporter has done and the only one nobody at the club will do out loud.
Boardroom28 Dec 2026
Wages swallow 104% of the Salernitana 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.
Player ratings28 Dec 2026
Marked 7.80. Ask anyone leaving the ground what settled it and you will get one name, which is the only award that has ever really counted.
The dugout28 Dec 2026
“That is what I want every week. Not the result, the way they went about it.” The manager, after 3‑0, already talking about the next one.
The dugout28 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.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad7 Dec 2026
8 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.
Loan watch7 Dec 2026
“I did not go to Hércules to sit and watch. I want to come back to Salernitana and fight for my place.” 4 appearances in 16 matches say the rest.
The terraces7 Dec 2026
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.
Match5 Dec 2026
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Luka Stojković. 2‑0 against Bari, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Squad7 Dec 2026
Mattia Vitale 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.
Squad7 Dec 2026
The manager has re-ordered his thinking and Mattia Vitale has come out of it lower. He will be told it is temporary, and the players who have heard that before will avoid his eye.
The dugout7 Dec 2026
“The players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 2‑0, Cristiano Ferri could afford to be generous.
The dugout7 Dec 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Mattia Vitale, and the manager let it.
Looking ahead7 Dec 2026
Salernitana take on the side everybody is chasing
Cosenza arrive as leaders. A side at the top is beaten roughly once a month, and the club that does it gets a week it remembers for a year.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad23 Nov 2026
Kees de Boer 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.
Match21 Nov 2026
Late, late show earns Salernitana a point
Minute 91, against Cavese, 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.
Player ratings23 Nov 2026
Successful dribbles: 17. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
The dugout23 Nov 2026
“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.
Match21 Nov 2026
It finished 1‑1, and it somehow always looked like it would. One of those afternoons where the table moves less than the tempers.
Squad23 Nov 2026
Words at Salernitana training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Simone Pieraccini 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 dugout23 Nov 2026
“It is not the end of the world and it is not good enough. Both of those are true.” The manager, after a 1‑1 draw, said the honest thing and then went to say it again inside.
The dugout23 Nov 2026
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Muhamed Varela Djamanca trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Looking ahead23 Nov 2026
He used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against Catania in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
The dugout16 Nov 2026
“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.
Squad16 Nov 2026
Kees de Boer 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 dugout16 Nov 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Eugenio D'Ursi, and the manager let it.
Loan watch16 Nov 2026
9 appearances at Salernitana and the goals keep coming. Salernitana are watching this more closely than the borrowing club would like.
Market16 Nov 2026
The name of Mattia Tascone keeps appearing in other people's back pages. Salernitana say nothing, which says plenty.
The dugout16 Nov 2026
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Salernitana, and both men came out saying it was fine.
The dugout16 Nov 2026
Nothing in writing and nothing in public: a word about playing time, given face to face at Salernitana. The team sheets over the next month will show whether it was worth having.
Looking ahead16 Nov 2026
Next up at home: Cavese, who go into it in position 13. The kind of fixture a season is quietly built on or quietly loses its shape in.
Squad16 Nov 2026
The selectors could not leave Mattia Tascone out
6.83 across ninety minutes and a place in the division's team of the week. He was the best player on that pitch and everybody there knew it.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Match7 Nov 2026
6‑3, and Facundo Lescano took the headlines on an afternoon when everything Salernitana tried came off. Days like this are retold all winter.
Match4 Nov 2026
Como go through and Salernitana go home, 0‑1 the scoreline that did it. The dressing room will call the league the priority now, because that is what dressing rooms say.
Player ratings9 Nov 2026
A brace, and Facundo Lescano takes the afternoon — 8.76
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Facundo Lescano provided it, and the 8.76 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Player ratings9 Nov 2026
Up for the corner, and Kees de Boer delivers — 7.85
Centre-halves are allowed forward twice a season and are judged on what they do when they get there. Kees de Boer scored, was marked 7.85, and got back before anybody noticed he had gone.
Player ratings9 Nov 2026
A defender's goal wins it for Salernitana — 7.75
1 for Armando Anastasio, marked 7.75, and a centre-half's name in the part of the report he normally only reaches by mistake. He will not be allowed to forget it in the dressing room for a month.
Squad9 Nov 2026
Kees de Boer in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Salernitana this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The terraces9 Nov 2026
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Luka Stojković 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.
Match7 Nov 2026
The drought breaks for Salernitana
5 without a win is the sort of run that changes how a town talks about its club, and Sorrento were the afternoon it stopped. Nothing is fixed by one result and everything feels different by one.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Match31 Oct 2026
No end in sight to Salernitana's wait for a win
4 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Salernitana has to find a result from somewhere.
The terraces2 Nov 2026
He is 23 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.
The dugout2 Nov 2026
Ismail Achik gets it from the manager
“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 swallow 106% of the Salernitana 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.
Player ratings2 Nov 2026
Marked 7.88 on an afternoon he ran from the first whistle to the last. Whatever else went wrong, Salernitana had the best player on the pitch.
Match31 Oct 2026
1‑1, and both dressing rooms will call it two points lost. A draw that asked plenty of questions and answered none of them.
Squad2 Nov 2026
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Simone Pieraccini was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout2 Nov 2026
The manager’s verdict
“I am frustrated, honestly. We did enough to win and we did not win.” Cristiano Ferri was not hiding it after 1‑1, and nobody in the Salernitana dressing room was either.
Looking ahead2 Nov 2026
He used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against Sorrento in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad19 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 Salernitana this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad19 Oct 2026
Filippo Vari is a better footballer than he was
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.
Match17 Oct 2026
0‑2 to Casarano, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
The dugout19 Oct 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Antonio Donnarumma, and the manager let it.
The dugout19 Oct 2026
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 0‑2, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
Squad19 Oct 2026
Simone Pieraccini 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.
Squad19 Oct 2026
One yellow too many, and a match watched from the stand. The most avoidable absence in football, and Salernitana will feel it on Saturday.
Looking ahead19 Oct 2026
He used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against Potenza in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
The dugout19 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
Upbeat
Squad12 Oct 2026
Kees de Boer in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Salernitana this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad12 Oct 2026
At 18 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.
The dugout12 Oct 2026
The manager makes an example of Mattia Vitale
“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.
Looking ahead12 Oct 2026
He used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against Casarano in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
The dugout12 Oct 2026
A conversation in the manager’s office, and a commitment that came out of it. Promises like that are cheap to make and expensive to break, and Eugenio D'Ursi has written the date down.
Squad12 Oct 2026
He looks like a man who lives here now rather than one who is working here. It took most of a season, and at Salernitana the difference is visible from the back of the stand.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad5 Oct 2026
Kees de Boer and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
The dugout5 Oct 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.
Boardroom5 Oct 2026
139% of the income goes out in wages at Salernitana
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.
Player ratings5 Oct 2026
Kees de Boer was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.03. 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.
Match3 Oct 2026
2‑2, and both dressing rooms will call it two points lost. A draw that asked plenty of questions and answered none of them.
The dugout5 Oct 2026
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.” Cristiano Ferri chose the glass-half-full version of 2‑2; the supporters left with the other one.
Player ratings5 Oct 2026
Successful dribbles: 13. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
The dugout5 Oct 2026
The manager wanted a different profile for this opponent, which is a real football reason and no consolation. He did nothing wrong and he did not play.
Squad5 Oct 2026
At 30 he is in the side on merit and somebody else is watching. Places at Salernitana are won quietly and lost loudly, and this one was won.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Squad28 Sep 2026
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 8 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Squad28 Sep 2026
Kees de Boer 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.
Match26 Sep 2026
It finished 1‑0, and it was Facundo Lescano’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Salernitana.
Player ratings28 Sep 2026
A performance of 8.04 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
The dugout28 Sep 2026
The manager makes an example of Ismail Achik
“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.
Squad28 Sep 2026
9 new faces, and Salernitana are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
The dugout28 Sep 2026
“That is what I want every week. Not the result, the way they went about it.” The manager, after 1‑0, already talking about the next one.
Squad28 Sep 2026
Words at Salernitana training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Simone Pieraccini 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.
Looking ahead28 Sep 2026
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Eugenio D'Ursi’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Salernitana needing him to play as if none of it matters.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad21 Sep 2026
Kees de Boer 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.
Squad21 Sep 2026
Filippo Vari is a better footballer than he was
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 dugout21 Sep 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.
Player ratings21 Sep 2026
Ninety minutes of Kees de Boer at his very best
Marked 8.03. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Salernitana.
Player ratings21 Sep 2026
Successful dribbles: 15. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
Match19 Sep 2026
It needed Kees de Boer to find the net to bring anything home at all: 1‑1 against Giugliano, and half the dressing room will call it a point won.
Squad21 Sep 2026
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Simone Pieraccini was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout21 Sep 2026
“A point is a point and I will take it, but we should have had all three.” Cristiano Ferri after the 1‑1 draw, and the sentence every manager in the country said at some stage this weekend.
Player ratings21 Sep 2026
Chances created: 9. Somebody has to open a door before anybody can walk through it, and he spent the afternoon opening doors.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Market14 Sep 2026
Filippo Vari hands in a written request
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Salernitana can pretend not to have heard.
Player ratings14 Sep 2026
Successful dribbles: 23. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
Match12 Sep 2026
It finished 2‑1, and it was Luka Stojković’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Salernitana.
Squad14 Sep 2026
“The easiest signature of my career.” Juan Ignacio Molina and Salernitana agree another 3 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Match12 Sep 2026
Conceding is one thing; the response is what tells you about a dressing room. Luka Stojković had Salernitana level again within 1 minutes, and Crotone never got to play with a lead at all.
Player ratings14 Sep 2026
Marked 7.65 on an afternoon he ran from the first whistle to the last. Whatever else went wrong, Salernitana had the best player on the pitch.
Squad14 Sep 2026
“I respect the manager and I am not going to sit here and pretend I am happy.” It is the most common sentence in football and it has never once been the end of a story.
The dugout14 Sep 2026
“The players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 2‑1, Cristiano Ferri could afford to be generous.
Squad14 Sep 2026
The formation has left Ouseynou Sow behind
Every shape has positions in it and this one does not have his. Salernitana will either change the shape, change his job, or change his club, and he is waiting to hear which.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Transfer targets24 Aug 2026
The deal with Dinamo Zagreb is done in every sense but the one that puts him on the pitch. Nothing goes wrong at this stage, except on the occasions when it does.
Squad24 Aug 2026
Kees de Boer 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.
Boardroom24 Aug 2026
5 academy graduates step up at Salernitana
Senior shirt numbers handed to boys the coaches have known since they were twelve. Most will not make it and all of them have already done the hard part.
Transfer targets24 Aug 2026
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.
Market24 Aug 2026
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Federico Ricci has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
Market24 Aug 2026
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Danilo Bartoli is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Market24 Aug 2026
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Salvatore Ferrigno has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
Market24 Aug 2026
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Cesare Scalise is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Transfer targets24 Aug 2026
Parma have been asked whether they would lend him. Loans are agreed quickly or not at all, and this one will be one or the other by the weekend.