“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 The request is on a desk at Cavese, and it is not being withdrawn.
Everything was agreed until it was not, and Elios Minaj reports back to Cavese with a summer to forget. Neither club is saying who walked away from the table.
Every long career reaches the week the last one is thought about. He would like it to be where he started, and Cavese know now that the thought has arrived.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Alessio Luciani was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
6 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
The deal that would have taken Leonardo Ubaldi to Arezzo has collapsed at the last stage, and he reports back to Cavese with a summer to forget and a season still to play. Nobody is saying which side walked away.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Gerardo Fusco will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Cavese 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 Cavese 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.
Cavese asked and Frosinone said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Cavese have lost him in all but the paperwork.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Cavese can pretend not to have heard.
The run now stands at 5, and the questions being asked around Cavese are no longer polite ones.
Boardroom1 Feb 2027
Cavese close the window on a squad of their own making
1 in and 0 out, and no more changes for months. The manager has what he has, the supporters have their opinion of it, and the table will have the last word.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Daniele Bolcano will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Cavese the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Alan Alegre 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 Alessio Luciani was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Cavese have lost him in all but the paperwork.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Cavese can pretend not to have heard.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the whole of the defence. 6 saves, several of them the kind nobody expects to see made, and ten outfield players who owe him a drink.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Cavese they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
There is no worse way to lose a footballer. Daniele Bolcano 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.
Alan Alegre 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.
“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 Cavese, and it is not being withdrawn.
100 goals for the club, every one of them filed away in the memory of a supporter somewhere.
Squad18 Jan 2027
Words at Cavese training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Alessio Luciani 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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Padova have kept their man, and Cavese go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Cavese have lost him in all but the paperwork.
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: Frosinone keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Cavese 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.
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Cavese has been clear about where Leonardo Ubaldi stands, which is more than many ever get.
Position 12, 22 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.
The kind of year that ends with a name being read out in a hall. Cavese had the benefit of it every week and now have the problem of everybody else knowing.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Cavese can pretend not to have heard.
Everything agreed with Frosinone, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Cavese can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
Alan Alegre 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.
Successful dribbles: 20. 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.
Alan Alegre 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.
Squad28 Dec 2026
Words at Cavese training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Alessio Luciani 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.
Every club 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 it has been tried.
Chances created: 13. Not on the scoresheet and not remotely anonymous — a passing performance that pulled a defence apart without leaving a mark on the column that gets read.
“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.
The dugout28 Dec 2026
Somebody else is better right now than César Horst
The team sheet says it in public every week until it changes. The only version of being dropped a footballer cannot argue with, and the one he takes hardest.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Cavese 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 Cavese this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
2‑3 to Audace Cerignola, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
Squad21 Dec 2026
Words at Cavese training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Alessio Luciani 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.
At 19 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
“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.
The dugout21 Dec 2026
The manager’s verdict
“That is on me. I pick the team and I picked wrong.” Managers say that when they mean it and when they need to be seen to, and after 2‑3 Sergio Bernardi left the room before anybody could ask which.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.61 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Cavese 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 Manuel Peretti was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout14 Dec 2026
The view from the dugout
“We will look at it, we will learn from it, and we go again.” The three sentences every manager keeps for a 2‑3 defeat, delivered by Sergio Bernardi to a room that had heard them before.
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.
Alan Alegre 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 Alessio Luciani was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
At 19 he was better than everybody his age in the division for four weeks running, which is harder than one good afternoon. Cavese will try not to make too much of it.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Alessandro Fiordaliso trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Alan Alegre 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.
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.
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.
“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.
The dugout30 Nov 2026
The view from the dugout
“We will look at it, we will learn from it, and we go again.” The three sentences every manager keeps for a 1‑2 defeat, delivered by Sergio Bernardi to a room that had heard them before.
The dugout30 Nov 2026
Somebody else is better right now than César Horst
The team sheet says it in public every week until it changes. The only version of being dropped a footballer cannot argue with, and the one he takes hardest.
The hardest thing about being 19 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Branco Salinardi did not need any: 8.00, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Branco Salinardi. 1‑0 against Trapani, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Manuel Peretti was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Somebody else has been better, the manager has said so with a team sheet, and there is no argument to be had. He will get the shirt back the only way it can be got back.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 8 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Giuseppe Fella provided it, and the 8.91 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Player ratings16 Nov 2026
Branco Salinardi, 19, plays like he has been here for years — 7.63
A mark of 7.63 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 19-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Cavese 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.
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.
The hardest thing about being 19 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Branco Salinardi did not need any: 8.31, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.67 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
He is 19, he is averaging 7.14, and older professionals have started passing to him in the difficult minutes. That last part is the real scouting report.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Cavese have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Alan Alegre 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 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.
Alan Alegre 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.
Squad2 Nov 2026
Words at Cavese training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Alessio Luciani 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.
Every club 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 it has been tried.
At 19 he was better than everybody his age in the division for four weeks running, which is harder than one good afternoon. Cavese will try not to make too much of it.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Sergio Bernardi after 0‑2, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
The system has changed and his position has not. A footballer can improve his form; he cannot improve the manager’s formation, and that is the whole of the problem.
In brief
The dugoutSomebody else is better right now than César Horst
The dugoutThe manager makes an example of Manuel Peretti
The dugoutElios Minaj has become a man the manager trusts
The hardest thing about being 19 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Branco Salinardi did not need any: 8.31, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.15 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
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.
Successful dribbles: 18. 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.
Behind, and beaten by any honest reading, until minute 90. Sorrento had the points in their pocket and a corner of the ground still believed, which is generally when it happens.
The hardest thing about being 19 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Branco Salinardi did not need any: 8.14, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Cavese this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 22 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.
“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.
The dugout19 Oct 2026
The view from the dugout
“We will look at it, we will learn from it, and we go again.” The three sentences every manager keeps for a 1‑3 defeat, delivered by Sergio Bernardi to a room that had heard them before.
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.
Squad19 Oct 2026
Elia Visconti 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 season average of 7.00 at an age when most of his year group are still in the youth team. Cavese know what they have, and so, by now, does everybody else.
Alan Alegre 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.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Sandro Iannuzzi is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Riccardo Andreoli 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.
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 one version of being left out a player cannot argue with, and the one he takes worst. Somebody else has been better and the team sheet says so, in public, every week until it changes.
3 goals in one game. The first was taken well, the second was taken greedily, and by the third the crowd were simply waiting for him to get the ball.
Player ratings5 Oct 2026
Branco Salinardi, 19, plays like he has been here for years — 8.51
A mark of 8.51 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 19-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Valerio Boffelli is 22, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Alan Alegre 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.
6 games unbeaten now. Some were earned and some were survived, but a habit is forming — and habits are the hardest thing in football to play against.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Words at Cavese training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Alessio Luciani 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.
Every club 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 it has been tried.
2 goals to the good, and then a slow surrender of everything that had been earned. Giuseppe Fella will not be the one blamed for it, but nobody at Cavese escapes the conversation that follows a collapse like this.
Two goals and a mark of 9.07 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Player ratings28 Sep 2026
Branco Salinardi, 19, plays like he has been here for years — 8.20
A mark of 8.20 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 19-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Alessio Luciani 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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 21-year-old it feels ownership of. Gerardo Fusco 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.
Player ratings28 Sep 2026
Elios Minaj was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.43. 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.
Two goals and a mark of 8.75 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Cavese this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Chances created: 13. Not on the scoresheet and not remotely anonymous — a passing performance that pulled a defence apart without leaving a mark on the column that gets read.
It needed Branco Salinardi to find the net to bring anything home at all: 2‑2 against Salernitana, and half the dressing room will call it a point won.
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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Manuel Peretti was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout21 Sep 2026
The manager’s verdict
“I am frustrated, honestly. We did enough to win and we did not win.” Sergio Bernardi was not hiding it after 2‑2, and nobody in the Cavese dressing room was either.
At 19 he is being measured against the rest of the division's kids and coming out in front. The senior version of this award is where the club would like this to lead.
Alan Alegre 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 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.
Cavese asked and Monaco said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
A deal that was a phone call from completion at lunchtime was dead by midnight. Cavese will try again when the window opens; Foggia may not be selling by then.
He is 22 and the ground already sings his name, which is a thing that happens to local boys and almost never to signings. Everything from here is measured against an affection he did nothing to earn except be from here.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Michele Galli is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Elia Cecconi is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Behind, and beaten by any honest reading, until minute 91. Benevento had the points in their pocket and a corner of the ground still believed, which is generally when it happens.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Marlon Ubani did not need any: 7.61, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
The deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 17 arrived, 1 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed one.
Alan Alegre 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 Alessio Luciani was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
At 21 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
19 times he got in the way of something. Centre-halves get written about when they make mistakes and ignored when they do not, so an afternoon like this needs saying out loud: he is the reason the scoreline reads as it does.
The manager has re-ordered his thinking and Thomas Alberti has come out of it lower. He will be told it is temporary, and the players who have heard that before will avoid his eye.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Cavese can pretend not to have heard.
Cavese asked and Spezia said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
“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 Cavese, and it is not being withdrawn.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Cavese have done the hard part with Lecce, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Cavese 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.
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.
Latina next, and one man in the Cavese dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought of him.
He is doing things on a Saturday afternoon that nobody around him can answer, which is flattering for about one season and a problem after that. Cavese will not keep him by pretending otherwise.
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: Inter keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
Alan Alegre 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.
There is a level at which a footballer stops being tested and starts being contained, and he reached it some time ago. Cavese know it, and so does everybody who watches him.
San Lorenzo have been asked whether they would lend him. Loans are agreed quickly or not at all, and this one will be one or the other by the weekend.
Squad17 Aug 2026
Words at Cavese training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Elia Visconti 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.
Alessio Luciani 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.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Matteo De Simone 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.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Orazio Orlando 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.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Simone Sanna 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.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Valentino Tedesco 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.
Francesco Orlando 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 Alessio Luciani was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Cavese, another week without a signature from Alessio Luciani.
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.
Squad3 Aug 2026
7 new faces, and Cavese 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.