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.
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.
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 Maluku Utara United runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
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.
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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 54 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
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
Boardroom100% of the income goes out in wages at Persita
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’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 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.
Squad6 Dec 2027
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Syahrian Abimanyu 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.
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.
Position 16 and 35 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.
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 Nov 2027
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.
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 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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 84 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
“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.
In brief
BoardroomWages eat 135% of everything Persita earn
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.
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
Squad12 new faces, and Persita are still learning each other
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.
Squad1 Nov 2027
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.
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.
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.
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
BoardroomWages eat 141% of everything Persita earn
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 121 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
“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.
In brief
SquadRayco falls out with a teammate over standards
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’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.
Position 16 and 35 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.
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.
Squad4 Oct 2027
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 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.
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.
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 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 8.00 — 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.
Bali United held the lead for 3 minutes, which is not long enough to enjoy it. Persita answered before the celebration had properly finished, and the shape of the afternoon changed with it.
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.
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.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Zanadin Fariz has just signed for Persita, and for once the answer mattered.
Squad20 Sep 2027
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.
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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 122 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
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 Sep 2027
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.
Bhayangkara Presisi made Persita work for it, but the scoreboard read 2‑1 at the end and the table does not ask how.
Player ratings13 Sep 2027
Pablo Ganet was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.30. 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 4.87. 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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 129 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
0‑4 against Maluku Utara United, and no complaints that would survive the replay. The manager spoke about character afterwards; the terraces used shorter words.
Position 16 and 31 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.
31 points and a position everybody in the ground can do the arithmetic on. The songs have stopped being about the team and started being about surviving, which is a different noise entirely.
Nobody makes a documentary about a hamstring and everybody in the game fears one. Persita will be careful with the return date, because the second one is always worse than the first.
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.
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.
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.
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.
“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.
At 34 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 7.98 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Successful dribbles: 21. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad23 Aug 2027
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.
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.
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
Squad23 Aug 2027
7 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.
12 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.
17 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.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.02 at 34, and nobody on the pitch was better.
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 4.92. 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.
26 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.
The run now stands at 11, and the questions being asked around Persita are no longer polite ones.
The terraces9 Aug 2027
The boos come down from three sides
“We pay for this every fortnight. The least we want is somebody who looks like he cares.” 5 of the 25 senior players walked off into it; the rest were not playing.
Successful dribbles: 22. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad9 Aug 2027
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 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.
35 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.
10 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.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Rayco provided it, and the 8.65 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody 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.
Squad2 Aug 2027
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.
The name of Andi Wibowo has come up in conversations Persita were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
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.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Andi Wibowo will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Persita the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad26 Jul 2027
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 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 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.
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 fee is $50.0K, the contract is signed, and the argument about whether he is worth it can begin. PSIM drove a hard bargain; time will say who won it.
The terraces19 Jul 2027
Persita spend $50.0K on the signing the town wanted
It is the rarest sequence in football: supporters ask for something, and the club goes and does it. $50.0K for Khairul Fikri, and for one week nobody is complaining about anything.
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.
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.
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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 33 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
The accountants will call it good business and they will be right, which is not the point anybody outside the boardroom is making. Jack Brown was one of the reasons people came, and $110.0K does not replace that by itself.
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.
Persijap paid $110.0K 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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 18 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
“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.
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.
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.
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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 25 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 8.82 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.
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.
Defending was optional and nobody took up the option. 6 goals between Persita and PSM, and not one of the people who paid to be there will ask for the money back.
Squad28 Jun 2027
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.
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 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.
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.
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 was told what my role would be, and I signed on that basis. It has not happened.” A grievance with a date attached is the hardest kind to settle.
Squad14 Jun 2027
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 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.
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 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.
Dejan Račić 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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 55 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
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.
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
Player ratings31 May 2027
Rayco was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.29. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
Player ratings31 May 2027
Dejan Račić was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.06. 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.
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 goal that put Bali United ahead was still being replayed on the concourse when Persita equalised, 4 minutes later. Leads are only worth what you do with them.
Squad31 May 2027
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Zalnando 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.
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.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Fairuz Ohorella will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Persita the goodbyes have quietly begun.
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.
Dejan Račić 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.
Marked 8.91 — 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.
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.
Successful dribbles: 22. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad17 May 2027
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.
Zalnando 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 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.
A clause somebody insisted on years ago, in a negotiation nobody remembers, has just paid Persita $46.0K. Igor Rodrigues left a long time ago; the paperwork stayed.
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.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Rayco provided it, and the 8.55 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody 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.
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.
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 was told what my role would be, and I signed on that basis. It has not happened.” A grievance with a date attached is the hardest kind to settle.
Squad3 May 2027
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.
Bae Sin-Yeong 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.
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.
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.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Fairuz Ohorella will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Persita the goodbyes have quietly begun.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persita this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad26 Apr 2027
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.
Marked 5.54. 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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 98 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
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.
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.
Marked 8.36 — 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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 105 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 8.21, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
Squad12 Apr 2027
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 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 manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Ahmad Nur Hardianto has his answer from Persita; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 114 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
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 Apr 2027
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.
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.
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.
Squad29 Mar 2027
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Zalnando 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.
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.
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.
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.
“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.
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.
Successful dribbles: 21. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad15 Mar 2027
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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 88 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
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.
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.
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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 97 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
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.
The rules permit it and it stings anyway. Fairuz Ohorella has agreed terms with Maluku Utara United for the summer, and until then he pulls on this shirt as a player who has already chosen his next one.
Beaten 2‑3, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Squad1 Mar 2027
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 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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 104 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
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.
Squad22 Feb 2027
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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 111 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
The terraces15 Feb 2027
The ground has had enough
“We travel everywhere and we get this.” 7 of the 32 senior players heard it walking off, and the ones who did not hear it 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.
“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.
Squad15 Feb 2027
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Zalnando 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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 118 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
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.
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 spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Muhammad Pratama is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Rachmat Supriadi is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Kurniawan Hardiyanto has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Rachmat Lilipaly 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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 125 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
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.
Squad1 Feb 2027
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.
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.
In brief
SquadZalnando falls out with a teammate over standards
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 141 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
The offer from Persija for Pablo Ganet 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.
Squad18 Jan 2027
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 offer from Persijap for Charisma Fathoni 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.
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 Jan 2027
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.
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.
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.
Dejan Račić 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.
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.
“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.
Squad21 Dec 2026
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Nazareno Roselli 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.
Zalnando 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 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.
“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.
Squad7 Dec 2026
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.
Bae Sin-Yeong 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.
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.
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.
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Nazareno Roselli 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.
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.
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.
Dejan Račić 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.
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.
Squad9 Nov 2026
Words at Persita training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Ryuji Utomo 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.
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.
Nobody makes a documentary about a hamstring and everybody in the game fears one. Persita will be careful with the return date, because the second one is always worse than the first.
Nazareno Roselli 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
“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.
Squad19 Oct 2026
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.