Marked for Cláudio Silva
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad5 Jan 2032
274 appearances across 8 seasons in these colours. Careers like that are not built any more, and Rosenborg know what they have.
Market5 Jan 2032
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Rosenborg they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad5 Jan 2032
Emerson 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 Jan 2032
Words at Rosenborg training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Aslak Fonn Witry 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.
Squad5 Jan 2032
When it matters, Emil Ceïde plays
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
Market5 Jan 2032
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Rosenborg, another week without a signature from Cláudio Silva.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match29 Dec 2031
Rosenborg are in among the leaders
Position 3 and 52 points on the board. Nobody at the ground will say the word out loud yet, and everybody at the ground is thinking it.
Market29 Dec 2031
“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.
Market29 Dec 2031
Théo Radelet has one foot out of the door
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Rosenborg they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad29 Dec 2031
Håkon Evjen 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 Rosenborg this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad29 Dec 2031
Words at Rosenborg training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Fredrik Sjøvold 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.
Squad29 Dec 2031
“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 Rosenborg know it.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad31 Mar 2031
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 20 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Boardroom31 Mar 2031
Pressure builds in the Arouca boardroom
The directors have stopped offering the manager public warmth. In football that is usually the stage before the short statement.
Player ratings31 Mar 2031
Successful dribbles: 25. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Market31 Mar 2031
Cláudio Silva has one foot out of the door
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Arouca they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad31 Mar 2031
Tempers go at Arouca
Ignacio de Arruabarrena 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.
Squad31 Mar 2031
Words at Arouca training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Lee Hyun-Ju 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.
Match29 Mar 2031
Beaten 0‑1, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Squad31 Mar 2031
Tiago Esgaio 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.
Boardroom31 Mar 2031
93% of the income goes out in wages at Arouca
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.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad10 Mar 2031
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Arouca may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Boardroom10 Mar 2031
There is no worse way to lose a footballer. Cláudio Silva 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.
Squad10 Mar 2031
Words at Arouca training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Fally Mayulu 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.
Squad10 Mar 2031
10 goals and a season average of 7.34. Form like that gets noticed well beyond this town.
Squad10 Mar 2031
The manager makes an example of Dylan Nandín
“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.
Match8 Mar 2031
Beaten 0‑2, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Player ratings10 Mar 2031
The one thing Dylan Nandín could not do
Shots: 12, enough of them from close enough that a striker in form scores two. He is not a striker in form.
Market10 Mar 2031
Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Dylan Nandín’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.
Player ratings10 Mar 2031
The one thing Lee Hyun-Ju could not do
Shots: 7, enough of them from close enough that a striker in form scores two. He is not a striker in form.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Player ratings3 Mar 2031
Successful dribbles: 30. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad3 Mar 2031
Batata keeps the receipts
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Arouca may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Boardroom3 Mar 2031
Pressure builds in the Arouca boardroom
The directors have stopped offering the manager public warmth. In football that is usually the stage before the short statement.
Player ratings3 Mar 2031
Age has not caught Javi Sánchez yet — 8.08
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.08 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Market3 Mar 2031
“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.
Market3 Mar 2031
Cláudio Silva has one foot out of the door
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Arouca they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad3 Mar 2031
Tempers go at Arouca
Ignacio de Arruabarrena 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.
Market3 Mar 2031
Jose Fontán 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 Arouca hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Squad3 Mar 2031
Fally Mayulu 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
Upbeat
Squad2 Dec 2030
There were 6 saves in it, and at least three that had no business being saves at all. The ten outfield players owe him a drink and they know it.
Squad2 Dec 2030
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Arouca may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Squad2 Dec 2030
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Ignacio de Arruabarrena commits to Arouca for another 2 years.
Match30 Nov 2030
Beaten 4‑5, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Squad2 Dec 2030
Tempers go at Arouca
Fally Mayulu 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.
Match30 Nov 2030
9 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Arouca and Benfica B in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
Market2 Dec 2030
“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.
Player ratings2 Dec 2030
Lee Hyun-Ju was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.81. 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.
Player ratings2 Dec 2030
A performance of 8.00 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad2 Sep 2030
A knee injury of the worst kind for Pedro Ferreira
92 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Arouca lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Player ratings2 Sep 2030
Successful dribbles: 28. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad2 Sep 2030
“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.
Squad2 Sep 2030
Ivan Lykholit is a better footballer than he was
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 23 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.
Market2 Sep 2030
Jose Fontán 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 Arouca hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Squad2 Sep 2030
Words at Arouca training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Fally Mayulu 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.
Player ratings2 Sep 2030
16 defensive actions and a clean sheet at the end of them. A defender's afternoon can only be told by what did not happen, which is why nobody makes a highlights package out of one and every manager in the division would take it.
Market2 Sep 2030
No place for Keder Junior in the plan
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Keder Junior has his answer from Arouca; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
Player ratings2 Sep 2030
A mark of 4.87 tells the story without any need for embellishment. He will want the tape of this one quietly lost.