From our football correspondent
Steady
Player ratings14 Sep 2026
Successful dribbles: 31. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Marco Imperiale 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.
Market14 Sep 2026
The deal that would have taken Stefano Mazzini to Trento has collapsed at the last stage, and he reports back to Carrarese with a summer to forget and a season still to play. Nobody is saying which side walked away.
Player ratings14 Sep 2026
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 9.04, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
Player ratings14 Sep 2026
A performance of 8.31 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
Match12 Sep 2026
It needed Filippo Distefano to find the net to bring anything home at all: 2‑2 against Spezia, and half the dressing room will call it a point won.
Squad14 Sep 2026
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Carrarese, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Squad14 Sep 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Vincenzo Fiorillo, and the manager let it.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Bartosz Salamon unhappy with how he is being used
Asked to play a role that is not his, or taken off before the hour once too often — Bartosz Salamon has let it be known that he does not like the way Carrarese are using him. Managers hear this long before the press does.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad7 Sep 2026
A one-man rearguard from Marco Bleve
There were 7 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.
Market7 Sep 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.
Squad7 Sep 2026
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Carrarese this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Boardroom7 Sep 2026
Wages eat 365% of everything Carrarese earn
There is a figure at which a wage bill stops being ambitious and becomes the reason nothing else is possible, and this club has reached it. Nothing is left over for a transfer, a stand or a rainy afternoon.
Squad7 Sep 2026
“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.
Player ratings7 Sep 2026
Successful dribbles: 19. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
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.
Squad31 Aug 2026
Marco Imperiale 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.
Player ratings31 Aug 2026
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 9.36, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
Match29 Aug 2026
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Emanuele Zuelli. 3‑1 against Mantova, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Player ratings31 Aug 2026
Marked 9.09 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
Player ratings31 Aug 2026
A performance of 8.93 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
Player ratings31 Aug 2026
Marked 8.30 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
Squad31 Aug 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Fabio Abiuso, and the manager let it.
Squad31 Aug 2026
He wheeled away like a man who had been carrying it for months, because he had. Carrarese have their signing off the mark and one press-conference question retired.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market24 Aug 2026
“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 Carrarese, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad24 Aug 2026
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Carrarese this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Market24 Aug 2026
He is 16, and nobody at Carrarese signed him for this season. Deals like this are judged in four years, by people who may not still be in the building.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market17 Aug 2026
Carrarese say no — this time
The offer from Cosenza for Stefano Mazzini 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.
Squad17 Aug 2026
Marco Imperiale 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.
Market17 Aug 2026
Experience through the door at Carrarese
Abdelrafik Gérard arrives at 33 with nothing left to prove and plenty left to pass on. Legs are a young man's currency; knowing where to stand never ages.
Squad17 Aug 2026
He trains hard, says the right things and goes home to an empty flat. Nobody at Carrarese has done anything wrong, which is exactly what makes it so difficult to fix.
Squad17 Aug 2026
A wage question at Carrarese
Marco Imperiale 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.
Squad17 Aug 2026
The competition arrived without a word said to him about it. Mattia Finotto keeps the shirt for now, at Carrarese's convenience rather than his own.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market10 Aug 2026
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Carrarese can pretend not to have heard.
Squad10 Aug 2026
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Emanuele Zuelli and Carrarese agree another 3 years.
Market10 Aug 2026
Mantova pay $1.1M, and the deal is done. The number reads well on a balance sheet; whether it reads well on the pitch is next season's question.
Squad10 Aug 2026
Marco Imperiale 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.
Squad10 Aug 2026
The manager makes an example of Emanuele Zuelli
“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.
Market10 Aug 2026
Still no offer on the table, and Marco Imperiale’s deal keeps shrinking. In boardroom language, silence this long stops being an oversight and starts being an answer.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad3 Aug 2026
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Julián Illanes commits to Carrarese for another 4 years.
Squad3 Aug 2026
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Carrarese this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Market3 Aug 2026
The name of Federico Accornero has come up in conversations Carrarese were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Market3 Aug 2026
“There is a gap, and pretending there is not helps nobody.” Neither side has moved, and the calendar is working for exactly one of them.
Market3 Aug 2026
Still no offer on the table, and Julián Illanes’s deal keeps shrinking. In boardroom language, silence this long stops being an oversight and starts being an answer.
Squad3 Aug 2026
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Emanuele Zuelli trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.