The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Kashima Antlers is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Kashima Antlers this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Kimito Nono 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.
Nobody upstairs has said anything, which is the loudest thing they could do. Results buy silence in this game; the account at Nashville SC is running low.
“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 The request is on a desk at Nashville SC, and it is not being withdrawn.
Jeisson Palacios 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.
Squad1 Jan 2029
Words at Nashville SC training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Javier Otero 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.
Squad1 Jan 2029
Hany Mukhtar loses the manager who believed in him
A change in the dugout is not one story, it is twenty-five of them. This is Hany Mukhtar's: he was somebody's player, and now he has to be somebody else's, starting from nothing.
Market1 Jan 2029
Owen Ferreira returns from a loan that gave him nothing
1 appearances and 0 goals is not a season, it is a year somebody has lost. Whether that is his fault, the borrowing club's or the people who arranged it is the argument the next few weeks will have.
37 days with the chair empty, a list of names that grows and shrinks by the day, and not one signature on anything. Every week that passes takes the best candidates off it.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Nashville SC this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad7 Aug 2028
Words at Nashville SC training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jeisson Palacios 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.
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Nashville SC has been clear about where Jhon Figueroa stands, which is more than many ever get.
24 months left and silence from upstairs — no offer, no talks, nothing for his people to answer. Clubs that let a calendar do their negotiating usually end up negotiating with the calendar.
Xavier Valdez 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.
Squad27 Mar 2028
Words at Nashville SC training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Edvard Tagseth 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.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Nashville SC have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Squad31 Jan 2028
Words at Nashville SC training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Edvard Tagseth 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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Nashville SC can pretend not to have heard.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Nashville SC this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.