A deal that was a phone call from completion at lunchtime was dead by midnight. Juventus will try again when the window opens; Cesena may not be selling by then.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Kenan Yıldız did not need any: 8.56, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
“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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Bremer was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
12 goals and a season average of 7.29. Form like that gets noticed well beyond this town.
Player ratings8 Feb 2027
Nick Woltemade was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.99. 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.
In brief
The dugoutThe manager makes an example of Dušan Vlahović
Player ratingsManuel Locatelli was on a different afternoon to everybody else
The clubs have shaken hands with Cesena; the player has not yet. Personal terms are next, and personal terms are where more deals die than anybody prints.
It is a specific kind of quiet, a ground watching a winning position dissolve. AS Roma kept coming because nothing stopped them, and Juventus will be asked about the last half hour all week.
Successful dribbles: 25. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
Boardroom1 Feb 2027
Juventus close the window on a squad of their own making
1 in and 4 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Juventus this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Genoa have kept their man, and Juventus go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Player ratings25 Jan 2027
A brace, and Ismaël Konaté takes the afternoon — 8.75
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Ismaël Konaté provided it, and the 8.75 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Juventus have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
The offer from Racing Santander for Filip Kostić 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.
Kenan Yıldız 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 offer went to Udinese this week and it is theirs to answer. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loud the door closes.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Juventus this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad18 Jan 2027
At 21, Kenan Yıldız is already the best thing here
An average of 7.10 in a first team he is several years too young for. Juventus have something, and by now the whole division has noticed.
Successful dribbles: 22. 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Bremer was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
This is not cover and nobody is pretending it is. $21.6M has been paid because Cher Ndour is straightforwardly better than what was already here, and the club has decided to stop waiting.
The offer from Monaco for Randal Kolo Muani 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.
Juventus offered $6.6M; AC Milan said it was not close. The manager will be told the money is still there for the right player, which is what managers are told.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Cher Ndour has just signed for Juventus, and for once the answer mattered.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Bremer was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
$21.6M on the table at Fiorentina. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
Juventus offered $26.1M; Como said it was not close. The manager will be told the money is still there for the right player, which is what managers are told.
Juventus have gone to AC Milan with a bid, and the supporters have gone to the internet with an opinion about it. Whether either changes anything is up to the selling club.
There are footballers who have a good season and footballers a season is remembered for, and the second kind get their names read out in a hall in the summer. Juventus will be quietly delighted and privately nervous.
Kenan Yıldız 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 worse way to lose a footballer. Carlo Pinsoglio 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.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Grady Makiobo is 19, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
In brief
SquadBremer falls out with a teammate over standards
The 85th minute, half the ground already edging towards the exits, and Francisco Conceição decided nobody was going anywhere. Lazio had no time left to answer.
6 wins on the spin now, and the question has changed from whether the run ends to who ends it. Confidence like this cannot be bought; it has to be earned exactly this way.
“I listened, I thought about it, and I am staying. That is the whole story.” The clubs had agreed a fee. Filip Kostić had not agreed to go, which turned out to be the part that mattered.
12 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere else.
Kenan Yıldız 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 Bremer was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Inter next, which means a week that starts on Monday. Everything else on this page will be forgotten by Saturday; this fixture will not be forgotten for a year.
22 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Juventus lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
The 85th minute, half the ground already edging towards the exits, and Kenan Yıldız decided nobody was going anywhere. Napoli had no time left to answer.
Player ratings21 Dec 2026
Kenan Yıldız, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 8.04
A mark of 8.04 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 21-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
A season average of 7.14 at an age when most of his year group are still in the youth team. Juventus know what they have, and so, by now, does everybody else.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Bremer was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The name of Filip Kostić has come up in conversations Juventus were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Derby days make names, and Nick Woltemade made his against Torino. 7‑1, bragging rights secured, and one half of town will be tired of hearing about him by Tuesday.
31 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Juventus lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
The board had gone up, the arguing had started, and then the ball was in the net in the 120th minute. Ravenna will replay every second of the added time for a week.
Beat anybody else and it is three points. Beat them, with his name on it, and it is a year of bragging rights for Juventus and a story that will outlast his contract.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Juventus have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Two goals and a mark of 8.11 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Kenan Yıldız did not need any: 8.57, 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 Juventus this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“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 Juventus hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
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.
Defending was optional and nobody took up the option. 6 goals between Juventus and Hellas Verona, and not one of the people who paid to be there will ask for the money back.
Some goals win a match and some take one off somebody else. Francisco Conceição scored in the 86th minute, Sassuolo had already begun thinking about the journey home, and Juventus took the lot.
9 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere else.
He is 23 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.
Squad30 Nov 2026
Words at Juventus training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jhon Lucumí 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.
Marked 8.28 — 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Juventus 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 Bremer was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
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.
7.99, 1 on the scoresheet, and the specific comedy of a back-four player celebrating like somebody who does this every week. He does not, and that is exactly why the ground reacted the way it did.
The training ground goes quiet for a fortnight. 12 men have gone off to be somebody else’s players, and the manager is left with the ones nobody has called.
Hard to beat is not the same as winning, but 7 matches without defeat is a foundation Juventus did not have in the autumn.
Squad16 Nov 2026
Words at Juventus training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Bremer 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.
8 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
A 3‑0 win over Sambenedettese, and the draw for the next round can be watched with some interest for once.
Player ratings9 Nov 2026
Ismaël Konaté, 20, plays like he has been here for years — 8.44
A mark of 8.44 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 20-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 Juventus this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 20-year-old it feels ownership of. Ismaël Konaté 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.
Squad9 Nov 2026
Words at Juventus training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Federico Gatti 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.
Kenan Yıldız 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.
“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 Juventus hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Squad2 Nov 2026
Words at Juventus training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Bremer 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.
Marked 8.25 — 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.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Juventus, and 10 appearances in 11 say he has earned the hearing.
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.
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.
“There are things I liked and things we will be doing on Tuesday until they are right.” 0‑0, and a manager who had already decided what Tuesday looked like.
The crowd waited for a goal that never came. AC Milan defended in numbers and left with what they came for, and the two sides could be playing still without troubling a scorer.
He used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against Genoa in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Francisco Conceição provided it, and the 9.00 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Successful dribbles: 29. 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.
Bremer 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.
Defending was optional and nobody took up the option. 6 goals between Juventus and Lecce, and not one of the people who paid to be there will ask for the money back.
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.
Marked 8.08 — 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.
Nobody will confirm this and nothing else explains the last month of selections. A costly error buys a player a period of being second choice that is always longer than the error was.
Goalkeepers do not get to make mistakes; they get to make goals. He made one, he knew it instantly, and there was nobody behind him to make it anything else.
Two goals and a mark of 8.77 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 Juventus this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
10 call-ups is a compliment to the squad and a headache for the man running it. He will get them back in a fortnight, tired, in various states of repair.
Squad12 Oct 2026
Words at Juventus training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Dušan Vlahović 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.
He is 23 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.
12 new signings in one window. Every one may be an upgrade and the side can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild the verdicts never mention.
Kenan Yıldız 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.
At 30 the improving is meant to be over. It is not: 3 points better than the mark taken at the start of the year, which is the sort of thing that happens to players who take the boring parts of the job seriously.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Bremer was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Alejo Antilef has just signed for Juventus, and for once the answer mattered.
Two goals and a mark of 9.54 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 19 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.
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.
Player ratings28 Sep 2026
Weston McKennie was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.56. 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.
Marked 8.28 — 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.
Bremer 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 Dušan Vlahović was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“We earned that. I asked them for a reaction and I got one, and now I want the same again on Saturday.” Umberto Parise on a 1‑0 afternoon that pleased him more than he was prepared to show.
One weekend, judged against everybody else's. Francisco Conceição has come out on top of it, and for most footballers a weekly award is the only silverware a career ever produces.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Kenan Yıldız signs something — a contract at Juventus or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Francisco Conceição provided it, and the 8.99 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
1 for Khéphren Thuram, marked 7.91, and a centre-half's name in the part of the report he normally only reaches by mistake. He will not be allowed to forget it in the dressing room for a month.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Words at Juventus training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Bremer 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Juventus this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
100 games in this shirt, through managers and relegations and everything else. Service like it is disappearing from the game and the crowd knows what it is watching.
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.
Nobody at Juventus will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
The dugout14 Sep 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.” Umberto Parise, on a 3‑0 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Randal Kolo Muani provided it, and the 8.94 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
“It was not right for me. I am not going to explain why to anybody except the people I owe an explanation to.” A deal agreed between two clubs, and a player who declined to be part of it.
The bid was some way short and Juventus did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Boardroom7 Sep 2026
Deadline passes with 8 signed and 4 gone
That is the business done at Juventus until the window opens again. Whether it was enough will be answered on Saturdays rather than in a column, and the first Saturday is close.
The training ground goes quiet for a fortnight. 10 men have gone off to be somebody else’s players, and the manager is left with the ones nobody has called.
“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 Juventus hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Allan Nyom is living that version at Juventus, and it tends to show in the first month.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Dušan Vlahović provided it, and the 9.39 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Player ratings31 Aug 2026
Kenan Yıldız, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 8.93
A mark of 8.93 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 21-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
“It was not right for me. I am not going to explain why to anybody except the people I owe an explanation to.” A deal agreed between two clubs, and a player who declined to be part of it.
Nick Woltemade 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 Bremer 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.
Successful dribbles: 17. 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.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Kenan Yıldız did not need any: 7.80, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Juventus can pretend not to have heard.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Bremer was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Senior shirt numbers handed to boys the coaches have known since they were twelve. Most will not make it and all of them have already done the hard part.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Como have kept their man, and Juventus go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
The shirt still fits. Nicolò Fagioli is back at Juventus, and half the ground remembers him in these colours already. Some signings need selling to the town; this one sold itself.
Juventus asked and Genoa said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Nicolò Fagioli is living that version at Juventus, and it tends to show in the first month.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Juventus this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad17 Aug 2026
Words at Juventus training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Federico Gatti 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.
Nothing about the week ahead is ordinary. Inter on Saturday, a town that has already started talking about it, and a dressing room that does not need telling what it means.
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.
Juventus and Fiorentina have settled on $24.0M. The rest belongs to the player and his agent, and a supporter who has watched one of these before knows not to buy the shirt yet.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Juventus have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Add another name to the list: Genoa have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Pierre Kalulu. The answer from Juventus has not changed — yet.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Juventus 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 Bremer was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The offer from FC Cincinnati for Ismaël Konaté 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.
Kenan Yıldız 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.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Juventus heard it as anything else.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Bremer was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.