“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Bari have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
13 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Bari hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Successful dribbles: 22. 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.
Simone Cinquegrano 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.
Two goals and a mark of 8.64 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Bari have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Bari this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Minute 92, against Mantova, 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.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Bari, and both men came out saying it was fine.
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Bari hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Bari this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Level with 90 minutes on the clock, after an afternoon Bari had all but put away. Catanzaro will call it a point earned; the home dressing room will call it two given away, and both of them are right.
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 dugout30 Oct 2028
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.” Fabio Ruggiero chose the glass-half-full version of 1‑1; the supporters left with the other one.
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.
Simone Cinquegrano 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.
A performance of 8.08 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
Player ratings23 Oct 2028
Andy Irving was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.02. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Bari told Ebrima Darboe something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
“We earned that. I asked them for a reaction and I got one, and now I want the same again on Saturday.” Fabio Ruggiero on a 2‑0 afternoon that pleased him more than he was prepared to show.
Catanzaro next, and one man in the Bari dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought of him.
“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 Bari, and it is not being withdrawn.
Bari ran out of time with Hellas Verona. The paperwork was open when the deadline passed, and a transfer that was almost done is now a transfer that never happened.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Bari this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Bari, and both men came out saying it was fine.
50 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Avellino lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at Inter is saying, and nobody at Avellino is enjoying the guessing.
The fee is $9.4M, the contract is signed, and the argument about whether he is worth it can begin. Udinese drove a hard bargain; time will say who won it.
Marco Sala has gone, the accounts have $5.2M in them, and the supporters have the feeling of having been sold something themselves. Good business and a good decision are not always the same thing.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Luca Palmiero will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Avellino the goodbyes have quietly begun.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Avellino this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
In brief
The terracesAvellino spend $9.4M on the signing the town wanted
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Bari will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
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.
Market28 Aug 2028
Marco Sala arrives at Bari in a $5.2M statement of intent
There comes a point where a club either backs its own ambition or admits it does not have any. Bari have paid $5.2M for Marco Sala, which is the loudest way there is of saying which one it chose.
Bari offered $1.1M; Hellas Verona said it was not close. The manager will be told the money is still there for the right player, which is what managers are told.
The deal with Rayo Vallecano 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.
$250.0K on the table at Udinese. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
Andy Irving 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.
Four paragraphs on the club website, none of them about football. The board thanked him, wished him well, and had the search under way before the page went up.
58 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Avellino lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
“I listened, I thought about it, and I am staying. That is the whole story.” The clubs had agreed a fee. Marco Sala had not agreed to go, which turned out to be the part that mattered.
The offer went to Udinese this week and it is theirs to answer. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loud the door closes.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Radomlje waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Avellino is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
“I am not thinking past Saturday, and I would advise nobody else to.” The caretaker’s first rule is to pretend the job is small; Salvatore Martinelli recited it perfectly.
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.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Achille Lombardi 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.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Bari will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
The offer went to Avellino this week and it is theirs to answer. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loud the door closes.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Bari can pretend not to have heard.
The chase for Antonio Energe ended with $1.2M changing hands and Crotone out of reasons to say no. The supporters will judge the fee the only way that matters: on Saturdays.
$1.3M was the most the club would pay and Renate 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.
The words a physio says slowly. 66 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 phone has started ringing about Marco Sala again, and this time the name on the line is Audace Cerignola. Avellino are listening politely and promising nothing.
Avellino asked and Renate said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Everybody at Avellino saw it before anybody said it, which is how this always goes. At 36 the decline is real and measurable — 3 points — and the only question left is how the club handles somebody it owes a great deal to.
13 signings in three months. Every one of them may be an upgrade and the team can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild that never appears in the transfer-window verdicts.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Alessandro Fontanarosa trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Lorenco Šimić has his answer from Avellino; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Tommaso Biasci signs something — a contract at Avellino or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
“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 Avellino, and it is not being withdrawn.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Avellino this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad24 Apr 2028
Aymen Sliti 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.
A player who expected to start watched it instead. The manager will call it a decision for the team; Dimitris Sounas will call it something else in private.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Michele Besaggio trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
“There are things I liked and things we will be doing on Tuesday until they are right.” 0‑0, and a manager who had already decided what Tuesday looked like.
Words at Avellino training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Aymen Sliti 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.
Something was said to Antonio De Cristofaro and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Avellino, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Alessio Tribuzzi’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Avellino needing him to play as if none of it matters.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Tommaso Biasci signs something — a contract at Avellino or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Position 6, 42 points, and a run-in that decides whether next season has Thursday nights in it. Nobody is calling it a race yet, which is what people say during one.
Vid Chinoso Juvančič has done the arithmetic and does not like the answer. Nothing corrodes a squad faster, and no club has ever solved it by explaining the wage structure to a footballer.
They sit in position 7 and they will be waiting. Away form is where a season shows its true character, and this side has a point to make about its own.
In brief
BoardroomThe Avellino production line keeps running
“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 Avellino, and it is not being withdrawn.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Avellino this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Aymen Sliti was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The fixture the rest of the division is looking forward to more than either of the sides in it. Both know a win changes the season and a defeat does not end it, which is what makes it hard to play.
“A point is a point and I will take it, but we should have had all three.” Ignazio Ferrigno after the 0‑0 draw, and the sentence every manager in the country said at some stage this weekend.
The crowd waited for a goal that never came. Benevento defended in numbers and left with what they came for, and the two sides could be playing still without troubling a scorer.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Dimitris Sounas trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
“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 Avellino, and it is not being withdrawn.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Aymen Sliti did not need any: 7.70, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
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 name of Vid Chinoso Juvančič has come up in conversations Avellino were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Position 3, 33 points, and every result so far reduced to one line. The second half of the season starts with the same squad and a different set of expectations.
Position 3, 29 points, and the result everyone checks first is now theirs. The word is still not being said around the ground, which is how you know everyone is thinking it.
Luca Mazzitelli 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.
Avellino asked and Lokomotiv Moscow said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Dimitris Sounas was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Marked 6.97 on 9 actions at both ends of the pitch. Midfielders like this get described as unspectacular by people who have never tried to play against one.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Avellino can pretend not to have heard.
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Avellino hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
A point taken on 90 minutes is worth exactly one point and considerably more than that to a dressing room. This side does not stop, which is a reputation worth more than the result.
“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 Avellino, and it is not being withdrawn.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Luca Palmiero will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Avellino the goodbyes have quietly begun.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 7.92 at 33, and nobody on the pitch was better.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Avellino have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
João Costa 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Dimitris Sounas was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
9 combined actions and 7.02. 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.
“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 Avellino, and it is not being withdrawn.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Avellino, and both men came out saying it was fine.
“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.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Luca Mazzitelli’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Avellino needing him to play as if none of it matters.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Luca Mazzitelli signs something — a contract at Avellino or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
He trains hard, says the right things and goes home to an empty flat. Nobody at Avellino has done anything wrong, which is exactly what makes it so difficult to fix.
Luca Mazzitelli 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Dimitris Sounas was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Avellino told Alessandro Fontanarosa something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Avellino, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Pescara next, and one man in the Avellino dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought of him.
Antony Iannarilli has done the arithmetic and does not like the answer. Nothing corrodes a squad faster, and no club has ever solved it by explaining the wage structure to a footballer.
“I have done everything asked of me in training and it has not changed a thing on a Saturday.” The most familiar complaint in football, and one Avellino will have to answer with minutes or with a transfer.
Squad13 Sep 2027
14 new faces, and Avellino 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.
Every shape has positions in it and this one does not have his. Avellino will either change the shape, change his job, or change his club, and he is waiting to hear which.
The dugout13 Sep 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.” Alfonso De Simone chose the glass-half-full version of 0‑0; the supporters left with the other one.
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.
Ninety minutes, no goals, and the argument started before the car park emptied: a point gained, or two thrown away against Pisa? Both sides of it will still be going on Thursday.