Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Persita will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Persita have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Ramón Bueno 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.
SquadJavlon Guseynov falls out with a teammate over standards
Back issues
173Edition
The Persita Courier
19 Nov 2029
From our football correspondentUneasy
The terraces19 Nov 2029
The mood at Persita has turned into something else
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Persita will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Javlon Guseynov 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.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Persita will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
“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 The request is on a desk at Persita, and it is not being withdrawn.
Ramón Bueno 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.
In brief
BoardroomWages eat 108% of everything Persita earn
What was said behind closed doors has now been said in front of a microphone. Everybody at Persita can do the arithmetic, including the man it is aimed at.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Persita will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
The official line will be that it was routine. It was not routine, the timing says so, and every person in that room knows what the next bad result costs.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad5 Nov 2029
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Javlon Guseynov 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 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 Persita know it.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Pablo Ganet signs something — a contract at Persita or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Persita will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The mood at Persita has turned into something else
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Persita will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Persita will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Ramón Bueno 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.
In brief
SquadJavlon Guseynov falls out with a teammate over standards
Boardroom125% of the income goes out in wages at Persita
What was said behind closed doors has now been said in front of a microphone. Everybody at Persita can do the arithmetic, including the man it is aimed at.
The official line will be that it was routine. It was not routine, the timing says so, and every person in that room knows what the next bad result costs.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Persita can pretend not to have heard.
Javlon Guseynov 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.
Squad8 Oct 2029
Emeka Nwabulu 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.
“I watch every Persita game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Semen Padang runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Pablo Ganet signs something — a contract at Persita or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persita 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 mood at Persita has turned into something else
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad24 Sep 2029
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rayco 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 at Persita 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.
Ramón Bueno 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.
Squad17 Sep 2029
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Emeka Nwabulu 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 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's fault and entirely his: a goal that goes into the book with his name against it and nothing about it intended. Persita deserved better, and so did he.
The words a physio says slowly. 17 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Beaten 1‑3, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Squad10 Sep 2029
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Javlon Guseynov 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 watch every Persita game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Semen Padang runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Pablo Ganet signs something — a contract at Persita or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
The words a physio says slowly. 24 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
The board’s statement ran to three sentences and one of them mentioned results. Bagas Septian has managed long enough to translate: win soon, or the next statement is shorter.
Nothing has been announced and everybody understands what it means. A board that summons the whole football department on a Tuesday morning is a board that has stopped believing the problem will fix itself.
Ramón Bueno 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.
The mood at Persita has turned into something else
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
The words a physio says slowly. 31 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Two goals and a mark of 8.28 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Persita 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 Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad27 Aug 2029
Emeka Nwabulu 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.
The words a physio says slowly. 38 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Persita can pretend not to have heard.
Ramón Bueno 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.
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.
Ninety minutes, no goals, and the argument started before the car park emptied: a point gained, or two thrown away against PSIM? Both sides of it will still be going on Thursday.
The words a physio says slowly. 45 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.84 at 34, and nobody on the pitch was better.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad13 Aug 2029
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Javlon Guseynov 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.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Pablo Ganet. 2‑0 against Arema, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Persita has been clear about where Ryuji Utomo stands, which is more than many ever get.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Pablo Ganet signs something — a contract at Persita or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
The words a physio says slowly. 52 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
What was said behind closed doors has now been said in front of a microphone. Everybody at Persita can do the arithmetic, including the man it is aimed at.
8 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.
“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 Persita, and it is not being withdrawn.
The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 4 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persita 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 words a physio says slowly. 59 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
The terraces30 Jul 2029
The mood at Persita has turned into something else
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
7 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.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Persita 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 Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad30 Jul 2029
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rayco 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.
3 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Persita can tell you which week it ends in.
The words a physio says slowly. 66 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
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.
Nūrlan Däirov 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.
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.
Ninety minutes, no goals, and the argument started before the car park emptied: a point gained, or two thrown away against PSBS Biak? Both sides of it will still be going on Thursday.
The words a physio says slowly. 73 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Persita will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Javlon Guseynov 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.
13 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.
The words a physio says slowly. 80 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Persita will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Persita can pretend not to have heard.
Everything was agreed until it was not, and Stefano Pratama reports back to Persita with a summer to forget. Neither club is saying who walked away from the table.
Ramón Bueno 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 words a physio says slowly. 87 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
The terraces2 Jul 2029
The mood at Persita has turned into something else
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Persita will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
The board have said in public what they had been saying in private. Results between now and the next meeting decide it, and everybody in the building knows the arithmetic.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Diyorbek Asomiddinov has just signed for Persita, and for once the answer mattered.
None of them will be seen by anybody outside the training ground for three years, most of them will never play a senior match, and one of them might change the club. That is the whole proposition, and it is why academies exist.
The words a physio says slowly. 94 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Persita will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The name of Stefano Pratama has come up in conversations Persita were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
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.
The words a physio says slowly. 101 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Persita will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Persita 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 Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Pablo Ganet signs something — a contract at Persita or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
The words a physio says slowly. 108 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Persita will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Persita have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Ramón Bueno 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.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Rayco. 1‑0 against Persijap, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Persita know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
The words a physio says slowly. 115 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
The terraces4 Jun 2029
The mood at Persita has turned into something else
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Persita will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
What was said behind closed doors has now been said in front of a microphone. Everybody at Persita can do the arithmetic, including the man it is aimed at.
5 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.
Centre-halves are allowed forward twice a season and are judged on what they do when they get there. Fajar Fathurrahman scored, was marked 7.17, and got back before anybody noticed he had gone.
The injury that keeps coming back, keeps being rushed back from, and quietly costs more careers than the dramatic ones. 16 days is the estimate; the honest figure depends on whether anybody is patient.
122 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Persita lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 67 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
At 34 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.11 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Persita 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 Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad28 May 2029
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Javlon Guseynov 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.
129 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Persita lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 74 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Position 16 and 15 points, and the table gets read bottom-up in this part of town. The calendar has stopped being a schedule and started being a countdown.
Ramón Bueno 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.
Marked 8.20 — 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.
136 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Persita lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 81 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Stefano Pratama will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Persita the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Javlon Guseynov 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.
Wages have outrun income and the accountants have started attending meetings they used to send apologies to. Ambition comes second in a season like this.
Squad14 May 2029
Emeka Nwabulu 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.
The board have said in public what they had been saying in private. Results between now and the next meeting decide it, and everybody in the building knows the arithmetic.
It has stopped being a mood in the stands and started being something organised. Boards can ignore a bad atmosphere for a long time; they cannot ignore this stage of it for very long at all.
Ramón Bueno 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.
Player ratings7 May 2029
Fareed Sadat was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.16. 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.
A touch he did not want, a bounce he could not have read, and his name in the wrong column. There is no consoling a man after one of these, and Persita will not try tonight.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad30 Apr 2029
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Javlon Guseynov 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 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.
Ramón Bueno 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.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Persita they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Wages have outrun income and the accountants have started attending meetings they used to send apologies to. Ambition comes second in a season like this.
Squad16 Apr 2029
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rayco 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.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 16 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
At 34 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.58 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Ramón Bueno 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.
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Persita has been clear about where Bagas Adi Nugroho stands, which is more than many ever get.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Persita know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
In brief
BoardroomThe Persita production line keeps running
The terracesThe press have found their man in Pablo Ganet
“We pay for this every fortnight. The least we want is somebody who looks like he cares.” 10 of the 30 senior players walked off into it; the rest were not playing.
Javlon Guseynov 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.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Fareed Sadat and Persita agree another 3 years.
Squad2 Apr 2029
Emeka Nwabulu 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.
Two goals and a mark of 8.27 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
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.
Ramón Bueno 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.
6 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Persita and PSBS Biak in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
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.
Nobody at Persita 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.
5 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 clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Persita 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 Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Wages have outrun income and the accountants have started attending meetings they used to send apologies to. Ambition comes second in a season like this.
Squad19 Mar 2029
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Javlon Guseynov 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.
A shoot-out is remembered by its ending, and this one ends with Emeka Nwabulu: 4 kept out, and a set of supporters who will describe every one of them for the next twenty years.
Cup ties wait for somebody to seize them, and Zanadin Fariz obliged against PSBS Biak. 2‑2 on the night, and the name in the next round’s hat is Persita.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad12 Mar 2029
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Emeka Nwabulu 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 Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“The easiest signature of my career.” Alfeandra Dewangga and Persita agree another 4 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Squad5 Mar 2029
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Javlon Guseynov 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 the name in every column and on every phone-in, which is a heavy thing to carry at any age. Some footballers thrive on it; others are quietly finished by it.
Marked 5.71. Nothing he attempted worked and by the hour mark he had stopped attempting much, which is the part a manager notices rather than the mistakes.
Nūrlan Däirov 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.
A defender's mistake gets tidied up by somebody else; a goalkeeper's ends up in the net. He knew before the ball crossed the line, and so did everybody in the ground.
He is the name in every column and on every phone-in, which is a heavy thing to carry at any age. Some footballers thrive on it; others are quietly finished by it.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 7.92 at 34, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Persita they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Javlon Guseynov 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.
Wages have outrun income and the accountants have started attending meetings they used to send apologies to. Ambition comes second in a season like this.
Squad19 Feb 2029
Emeka Nwabulu 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.
Marked 8.57 — 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 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.
Ramón Bueno 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.
“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.
Squad12 Feb 2029
The manager has not finished forgetting Pablo Ganet's mistake
Publicly it is behind everybody. It is not behind the man who picks the team, and the only place that shows is a team sheet. He will get another chance; he will get it in a match that matters less.
14 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.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Persita know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Marked 5.80. Nothing he attempted worked and by the hour mark he had stopped attempting much, which is the part a manager notices rather than the mistakes.
He left as a boy and has come back still knowing where the away end is. Most signings have to be explained to a town; this one needed a photograph and nothing else.
He left as a boy and has come back still knowing where the away end is. Most signings have to be explained to a town; this one needed a photograph and nothing else.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Boardroom5 Feb 2029
5 academy players handed senior numbers at Persita
The morning the pathway stops being a brochure and becomes a team sheet. Most of them will not be here in three years; all of them have already done the hard part, which was getting to today.
Squad5 Feb 2029
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Javlon Guseynov 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.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Andi Darmawan is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Andri Santoso 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad29 Jan 2029
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Emeka Nwabulu 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.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Persita they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Wages have outrun income and the accountants have started attending meetings they used to send apologies to. Ambition comes second in a season like this.
In brief
SquadWords at Persita training over how hard people work
Ramón Bueno 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.
The board have said in public what they had been saying in private. Results between now and the next meeting decide it, and everybody in the building knows the arithmetic.
The official line will be that it was routine. It was not routine, the timing says so, and every person in that room knows what the next bad result costs.
Javlon Guseynov 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.
Squad8 Jan 2029
Emeka Nwabulu 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.
Everyone has stopped pretending: Semen Padang will make the call about Stefano Pratama this week. Persita have a number in mind, and the number is not shy.
A year in and the language has not come, the city has not opened up, and he eats alone more often than anybody at Persita would like to admit. It is showing on Saturdays.
Nobody at Persita 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.
An individual honour is a strange thing in a team game, and the best of them are never argued with. He has had the sort of year that ends with his name being read out, and Persita have had the benefit of it.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Persita 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 Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad1 Jan 2029
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Emeka Nwabulu 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.
0 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.
Javlon Guseynov 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.
Wages have outrun income and the accountants have started attending meetings they used to send apologies to. Ambition comes second in a season like this.
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.
An individual honour is a strange thing in a team game, and the best of them are never argued with. He has had the sort of year that ends with his name being read out, and Persita have had the benefit of 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 Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The injury that keeps coming back, keeps being rushed back from, and quietly costs more careers than the dramatic ones. 15 days is the estimate; the honest figure depends on whether anybody is patient.
In brief
SquadWords at Persita training over how hard people work
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad11 Dec 2028
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Javlon Guseynov 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.
The board’s statement ran to three sentences and one of them mentioned results. Bagas Septian has managed long enough to translate: win soon, or the next statement is shorter.
Nothing has been announced and everybody understands what it means. A board that summons the whole football department on a Tuesday morning is a board that has stopped believing the problem will fix itself.
Ramón Bueno 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Wages have outrun income and the accountants have started attending meetings they used to send apologies to. Ambition comes second in a season like this.
Squad27 Nov 2028
Emeka Nwabulu 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.
Nūrlan Däirov 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
In brief
SquadWords at Persita training over how hard people work
The board’s statement ran to three sentences and one of them mentioned results. Bagas Septian has managed long enough to translate: win soon, or the next statement is shorter.
Nothing has been announced and everybody understands what it means. A board that summons the whole football department on a Tuesday morning is a board that has stopped believing the problem will fix itself.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad6 Nov 2028
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Emeka Nwabulu 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.
Wages have outrun income and the accountants have started attending meetings they used to send apologies to. Ambition comes second in a season like this.
Squad30 Oct 2028
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Javlon Guseynov 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.
Ramón Bueno 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.
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.
Javlon Guseynov 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.
In brief
SquadWords at Persita training over how hard people work
Ramón Bueno 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.
The board have said in public what they had been saying in private. Results between now and the next meeting decide it, and everybody in the building knows the arithmetic.
The official line will be that it was routine. It was not routine, the timing says so, and every person in that room knows what the next bad result costs.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Wages have outrun income and the accountants have started attending meetings they used to send apologies to. Ambition comes second in a season like this.
Squad2 Oct 2028
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Javlon Guseynov 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 am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Persita, and 1 appearances in 13 say he has earned the hearing.
11 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.
Ramón Bueno 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 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.
Squad25 Sep 2028
Nur Diansyah 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.
He found out with everybody else, an hour before kick-off, from a sheet of paper on a wall. Nobody at Persita pretended it was anything other than a decision about him.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad18 Sep 2028
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Javlon Guseynov 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 am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Persita, and 0 appearances in 5 say he has earned the hearing.
Squad18 Sep 2028
5 new faces, and Persita 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.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 15 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Successful dribbles: 21. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad11 Sep 2028
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Javlon Guseynov 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 needed Esal Sahrul to find the net to bring anything home at all: 1‑1 against Bhayangkara Presisi, and half the dressing room will call it a point won.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Persita know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
The board’s statement ran to three sentences and one of them mentioned results. Bagas Septian has managed long enough to translate: win soon, or the next statement is shorter.
Nothing has been announced and everybody understands what it means. A board that summons the whole football department on a Tuesday morning is a board that has stopped believing the problem will fix itself.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Reza Cheshmi has just signed for Persita, and for once the answer mattered.
At 23 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.
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 an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 7.99 at 33, and nobody on the pitch was better.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad28 Aug 2028
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Javlon Guseynov 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 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.
A player who expected to start watched it instead. The manager will call it a decision for the team; Alfeandra Dewangga will call it something else in private.
Ramón Bueno 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.
Nobody at Persita 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.
Shots: 10. Goals: none. The chances were there and they were good ones, and they went into the stand, the goalkeeper's arms and the side netting in roughly that order.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Persita know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
The board had gone up, the arguing had started, and then the ball was in the net in the 90th minute. Arema will replay every second of the added time for a week.
Javlon Guseynov 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.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Rayco. 2‑1 against Arema, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Player ratings14 Aug 2028
Rayco was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.26. 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.
Squad14 Aug 2028
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Fajar Fathurrahman 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.
Safrudin Tahar is 34 and has run out of things to prove. What he has left is where to stand, when to slow it down and what to say at half-time, and none of that is on a fitness chart.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Persita know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
The board’s statement ran to three sentences and one of them mentioned results. Bagas Septian has managed long enough to translate: win soon, or the next statement is shorter.
Ramón Bueno 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.
Madura United will keep picking him until June and will get nothing for him after it. Dzaky Asraf has pre-agreed a move to Persita, and the only people who lose in that arrangement are the ones who let the contract run down.
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.
Persijap paid $40.0K and Persita took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
The award is a small thing with a heavy meaning: for four weeks nobody in this division did his job better. Persita have the trophy on a shelf and the player in the side.
Two goals and a mark of 9.71 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
“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 Persita, and it is not being withdrawn.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
Squad31 Jul 2028
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Javlon Guseynov 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.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
19 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.
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.
“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 Persita, and it is not being withdrawn.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Player ratings17 Jul 2028
Jaider Cortes was on a different afternoon to everybody else
9.27. 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.
Squad17 Jul 2028
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rayco 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 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.
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.
Ramón Bueno 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.
He is the name in every column and on every phone-in, which is a heavy thing to carry at any age. Some footballers thrive on it; others are quietly finished by it.
Nobody at Persita 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.
What was said behind closed doors has now been said in front of a microphone. Everybody at Persita can do the arithmetic, including the man it is aimed at.
Two goals and a mark of 8.38 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
“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 Persita, and it is not being withdrawn.
Position 3, 31 points, and the result everyone checks first is now theirs. The word is still not being said around the ground, which is how you know everyone is thinking it.
Javlon Guseynov 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.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 21 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
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.
Squad3 Jul 2028
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Fajar Fathurrahman 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.
Nūrlan Däirov 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.
At 23 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.
Marked 8.21 — 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.
The mood at Persita has turned into something else
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
7 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad19 Jun 2028
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rayco 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 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.
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.
“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 Persita, and it is not being withdrawn.
Ramón Bueno 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.
What was said behind closed doors has now been said in front of a microphone. Everybody at Persita can do the arithmetic, including the man it is aimed at.
5 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.
Squad5 Jun 2028
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rayco 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 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 upstairs has said anything, which is the loudest thing they could do. Results buy silence in this game; the account at Persita is running low.
Player ratings29 May 2028
A brace, and Jaider Cortes takes the afternoon — 9.38
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Jaider Cortes provided it, and the 9.38 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
4 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.
Jaider Cortes 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.
6 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Persita and Bali United in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
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 mood at Persita has turned into something else
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
Persija go through and Persita go home, 0‑2 the scoreline that did it. The dressing room will call the league the priority now, because that is what dressing rooms say.
Javlon Guseynov 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 particular warmth a ground reserves for a 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Jaider Cortes 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.
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Pablo Ganet, and the manager let it.
Squad22 May 2028
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Fajar Fathurrahman 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.
Ramón Bueno 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.
The goal that put Bhayangkara Presisi ahead was still being replayed on the concourse when Persita equalised, 2 minutes later. Leads are only worth what you do with them.
The board’s statement ran to three sentences and one of them mentioned results. Bagas Septian has managed long enough to translate: win soon, or the next statement is shorter.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Hard to beat is not the same as winning, but 6 matches without defeat is a foundation Persita did not have in the autumn.
Squad8 May 2028
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rayco 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.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persita 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.
Clubs make promises constantly and the page usually only hears about them when they are broken. This one was honoured, and the dressing room noticed that faster than any supporter did.
The mood at Persita has turned into something else
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
3 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for 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 Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad24 Apr 2028
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rayco 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.
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.
Arema made Persita work for it, but the scoreboard read 1‑0 at the end and the table does not ask how.
Player ratings17 Apr 2028
Rayco was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.07. 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.
Zanadin Fariz 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.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 6 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Javlon Guseynov 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.
It finished 1‑0, and it was Jaider Cortes’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Persita.
Squad10 Apr 2028
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Fajar Fathurrahman 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 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.
The board have said in public what they had been saying in private. Results between now and the next meeting decide it, and everybody in the building knows the arithmetic.
Ramón Bueno 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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 22-year-old it feels ownership of. Jaider Cortes 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.
The mood at Persita has turned into something else
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad27 Mar 2028
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rayco 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.
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.
Every touch is being weighed now, in print and everywhere else. Some players grow into that and some are quietly ruined by it, and nobody knows which in advance.
9 attempts, none of them in. He got into the right places all afternoon, which is the hard part, and did the easy part badly — and that is the version of a bad day a manager can live with.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persita 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.
5 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.
A shoot-out is remembered by its ending, and this one ends with Khairul Fikri: 1 kept out, and a set of supporters who will describe every one of them for the next twenty years.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad13 Mar 2028
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Javlon Guseynov 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.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 6 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Ramón Bueno 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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 22-year-old it feels ownership of. Jaider Cortes 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.
The mood at Persita has turned into something else
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
2 in front and in complete control, and it finished with PSM the happier side. There is no version of this afternoon that Persita will enjoy reviewing.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.93 at 33, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Javlon Guseynov 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.
Squad28 Feb 2028
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rayco 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.
5 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.
Jaider Cortes 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.
Nobody at Persita 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad14 Feb 2028
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Javlon Guseynov 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 pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Éber Bessa, and the manager let it.
Squad14 Feb 2028
5 new faces, and Persita 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.
The shirt still fits. Frengky Missa is back at Persita, and half the ground remembers him in these colours already. Some signings need selling to the town; this one sold itself.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Onofieme Osagie is living that version at Persita, and it tends to show in the first month.
5 boys move up, and somewhere in the building the people who coached them at twelve are quietly having the best morning of their working year. Nothing about this shows up in a result and it is why the academy exists.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Ahmad Lilipaly is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Bagus Asnawi 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. Hanif Wardana 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.
BoardroomPersita turn down the training-ground plan
The terracesEverybody has an opinion about Matheus Alves
79Edition
The Persita Courier
31 Jan 2028
From our football correspondentUneasy
The terraces31 Jan 2028
The mood at Persita has turned into something else
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad31 Jan 2028
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Javlon Guseynov 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.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Emeka Nwabulu trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
A new face in his position, and Éber Bessa suddenly has to win back what he thought he owned. Persita have promised nothing — clubs rarely do at this stage.
Ramón Bueno 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.
Nobody at Persita 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.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Persita will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
The deal that would have taken Hokky Caraka to PSIM has collapsed at the last stage, and he reports back to Persita with a summer to forget and a season still to play. Nobody is saying which side walked away.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
In brief
SquadWords at Persita training over how hard people work
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Persita will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Persita can pretend not to have heard.
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.
Everyone has stopped pretending: PSBS Biak will make the call about Hokky Caraka this week. Persita have a number in mind, and the number is not shy.
Squad10 Jan 2028
The manager has not finished forgetting Pablo Ganet's mistake
Publicly it is behind everybody. It is not behind the man who picks the team, and the only place that shows is a team sheet. He will get another chance; he will get it in a match that matters less.
Zanadin Fariz 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.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Persita will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
It has stopped being a mood in the stands and started being something organised. Boards can ignore a bad atmosphere for a long time; they cannot ignore this stage of it for very long at all.
The board’s statement ran to three sentences and one of them mentioned results. Bagas Septian has managed long enough to translate: win soon, or the next statement is shorter.
An individual honour is a strange thing in a team game, and the best of them are never argued with. He has had the sort of year that ends with his name being read out, and Persita have had the benefit of it.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Persita can pretend not to have heard.
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 was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
0 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.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Persita know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.