Marked for Samuel Giovane
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Squad23 Nov 2026
128 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Catanzaro lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Player ratings23 Nov 2026
At 34 every good afternoon gets called a throwback, and this one was: 8.08, and nobody on the pitch better.
Match21 Nov 2026
Nobody wants to play Catanzaro 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.
Squad23 Nov 2026
Marco Ruggero 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 terraces23 Nov 2026
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Samuel Giovane 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.
Match21 Nov 2026
Three points for Catanzaro, 2‑0 the final word against Mantova in a contest settled by the finer margins.
The dugout23 Nov 2026
The view from the dugout
“We controlled it. There were spells I did not like and we will look at them, but the group showed me something.” Orazio Fortunato, on a 2‑0 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.
Squad23 Nov 2026
Every signing waits for it and every press conference asks about it until it comes. It has come, Catanzaro have their man off the mark, and the second one is always easier.
The dugout23 Nov 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.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Match31 Oct 2026
Catanzaro win it in stoppage time
The board had gone up, the arguing had started, and then the ball was in the net in the 91th minute. Carrarese will replay every second of the added time for a week.
Player ratings2 Nov 2026
Two goals and a mark of 8.48 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
The dugout2 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.
Market2 Nov 2026
Pietro Iemmello wants to know where this is going
“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 Catanzaro hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Squad2 Nov 2026
Matias Antonini 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.
Match31 Oct 2026
Three points for Catanzaro, 2‑1 the final word against Carrarese in a contest settled by the finer margins.
Boardroom2 Nov 2026
128% of the income goes out in wages at Catanzaro
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 ratings2 Nov 2026
A midfielder is measured on whether the team functions when he is on the pitch, which is nearly impossible to see and completely obvious in retrospect. 10 actions, 7.37, and a manager who will not be substituting him again in a hurry.
The dugout2 Nov 2026
The manager makes an example of Samuel Giovane
“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
Crisis
Squad31 Aug 2026
A knee injury of the worst kind for Matias Antonini
38 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Catanzaro lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Market31 Aug 2026
Catanzaro say no — this time
The offer from Cambridge United for Samuel Giovane was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
Market31 Aug 2026
“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.
Match29 Aug 2026
A bad afternoon for Catanzaro against Pisa
1‑3 to Pisa, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
The dugout31 Aug 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Pietro Iemmello, and the manager let it.
The dugout31 Aug 2026
Antonio Candela is still being punished for one mistake
Nobody will confirm it and the team sheets confirm it every week. One error has bought him a spell as second choice that is already longer than the error deserved.
Squad31 Aug 2026
Too much change too quickly at Catanzaro
11 signings in three months. Every one of them may be an upgrade and the team can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild that never appears in the transfer-window verdicts.
The dugout31 Aug 2026
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 1‑3, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
Player ratings31 Aug 2026
One lapse, one goal, and ninety minutes of honest work counting for nothing. That is the job at Catanzaro, and it is a cruel one.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad24 Aug 2026
Matias Antonini 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.
Boardroom24 Aug 2026
1 academy players handed senior numbers at Catanzaro
The morning the pathway stops being a brochure and becomes a team sheet. Most of them will not be here in three years; all of them have already done the hard part, which was getting to today.
Market24 Aug 2026
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Alberto Bruno 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.
Boardroom24 Aug 2026
Catanzaro say no to the training-ground money
The plan went upstairs and came back down. Nothing about that will make a headline anywhere else, and everybody who works at the training ground will remember it for years.
Looking ahead24 Aug 2026
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Marco D'Alessandro’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Catanzaro needing him to play as if none of it matters.
Squad24 Aug 2026
He trains hard, says the right things and goes home to an empty flat. Nobody at Catanzaro has done anything wrong, which is exactly what makes it so difficult to fix.
Market24 Aug 2026
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Samuel Giovane signs something — a contract at Catanzaro or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Looking ahead24 Aug 2026
Next up at home: Pisa, who go into it in position 17. The kind of fixture a season is quietly built on or quietly loses its shape in.