Marked for Gianluca Clemente
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Squad28 Aug 2028
23 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Cosenza lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Market28 Aug 2028
“It was not right for me. I am not going to explain why to anybody except the people I owe an explanation to.” A deal agreed between two clubs, and a player who declined to be part of it.
Player ratings28 Aug 2028
A brace, and Marco Tumminello takes the afternoon — 9.18
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Marco Tumminello provided it, and the 9.18 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Market28 Aug 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.
Market28 Aug 2028
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Cosenza they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Match26 Aug 2028
Cosenza make it 3 in a row
Momentum is a hard thing to buy and an easy thing to lose, and right now Cosenza have 3 straight wins of it.
Boardroom28 Aug 2028
There is no worse way to lose a footballer. Abdullah Al-Bahri has pre-agreed a move away, which means every appearance between now and June is made by a man the club can no longer sell, and somebody upstairs will be asked why the contract was allowed to get here.
Market28 Aug 2028
Parma paid $1.2M and Cosenza took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
Squad28 Aug 2028
Gianmarco Greco is a better footballer than he was
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 19 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.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad7 Aug 2028
Riccardo Palmieri damages knee ligaments — 46 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 46 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.
The dugout7 Aug 2028
Tim Väyrynen: 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.” Cosenza have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Market7 Aug 2028
The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.
Squad7 Aug 2028
At 20 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.
Market7 Aug 2028
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
Squad7 Aug 2028
“The easiest signature of my career.” Nicolò Contiliano and Cosenza agree another 3 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Squad7 Aug 2028
Words exchanged at Cosenza
Lautaro Valenti 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.
Market7 Aug 2028
He left as a boy and has come back still knowing where the away end is. Most signings have to be explained to a town; this one needed a photograph and nothing else.
Transfer targets7 Aug 2028
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Fiorentina have kept their man, and Cosenza go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Player ratings6 Mar 2028
A brace, and Michele Emmausso takes the afternoon — 8.64
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Michele Emmausso provided it, and the 8.64 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Match4 Mar 2028
Cosenza cannot stop winning
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.
Match4 Mar 2028
Another one collected away from home
4 on the bounce on the road for Cosenza. The coaches leave early, arrive at unlovely grounds in the dark, and keep coming home with three points.
Squad6 Mar 2028
Lautaro Valenti 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.
Match4 Mar 2028
Three points for Cosenza, 2‑1 the final word against Foggia in a contest settled by the finer margins.
Squad6 Mar 2028
A falling-out at Cosenza
Andrea Cogoni and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
The dugout6 Mar 2028
The manager makes an example of Mattia Ievoli
“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.
Squad6 Mar 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.
The dugout6 Mar 2028
The team sheet said everything about Paolo Dametto
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 Paolo Dametto.