86 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Sassuolo lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
0‑3 to AC Milan, and it was every bit as bad as the number suggests. There are defeats you argue about and defeats you apologise for; this was the second kind.
At 22 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.
Jay Idzes and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Squad23 Aug 2027
Words at Sassuolo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Matteo Gabbia 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.
Senior shirt numbers handed to boys the coaches have known since they were twelve. Most will not make it and all of them have already done the hard part.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Giacomo Ferrara has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Carlo Bianchi 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 words a physio says slowly. 93 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.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 23 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
Josh Doig was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Matteo Gabbia was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
A clause somebody insisted on years ago, in a negotiation nobody remembers, has just paid Sassuolo $1.4M. Filippo Romagna left a long time ago; the paperwork stayed.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Jay Idzes signs something — a contract at Sassuolo or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Nothing in writing and nothing in public: a word about playing time, given face to face at Sassuolo. The team sheets over the next month will show whether it was worth having.
101 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Sassuolo lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Sassuolo will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
The deal with CSKA Moscow is done in every sense but the one that puts him on the pitch. Nothing goes wrong at this stage, except on the occasions when it does.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 22 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
Josh Doig and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Armand Laurienté signs something — a contract at Sassuolo or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
109 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Sassuolo lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Cagliari have accepted the money. What Sassuolo do not yet have is the man, and between here and the photograph is a conversation about wages that both sides are dreading.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Sassuolo will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
“I listened, I thought about it, and I am staying. That is the whole story.” The clubs had agreed a fee. Luca Lungu had not agreed to go, which turned out to be the part that mattered.
Jay Idzes 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 is not a grievance and it is not a demand: he wants to play continental football, and he has stopped hiding it. Whether Sassuolo can give him that is a question about the club, not about him.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Josh Doig signs something — a contract at Sassuolo or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
118 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Sassuolo lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 32 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 Sassuolo this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad26 Jul 2027
Matteo Gabbia 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.
Perugia paid $330.0K and Sassuolo took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.
127 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Sassuolo lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Sassuolo will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Sassuolo have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
The deal with Cagliari is done in every sense but the one that puts him on the pitch. Nothing goes wrong at this stage, except on the occasions when it does.
Josh Doig was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Domenico Berardi was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Alfred Gomis damages knee ligaments — 135 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 135 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 Sassuolo 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 Sassuolo, and it is not being withdrawn.
Sassuolo have gone to Modena with a bid, and the supporters have gone to the internet with an opinion about it. Whether either changes anything is up to the selling club.
Sassuolo asked and Benevento said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Josh Doig and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Squad12 Jul 2027
Words at Sassuolo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Matteo Gabbia 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.
Alfred Gomis damages knee ligaments — 143 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 143 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 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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 56 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 Sassuolo can pretend not to have heard.
The offer from Audace Cerignola for Darryl Bakola 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.
Sassuolo asked and Modena said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Federico Bonazzoli was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
In brief
SquadWords at Sassuolo training over how hard people work
“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 Sassuolo, and it is not being withdrawn.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Virtus Entella waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Sassuolo is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
18 goals in 28 games at Gornik Zabrze — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Sassuolo updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
Ignace Van Der Brempt and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Matteo Cingolani is 19, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
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 approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.
Squad28 Jun 2027
Aster Vranckx has improved at 24, which nobody expected
Careers are supposed to plateau and then decline, and the players who ignore that are always the ones who were listening on the training ground. 3 points of it, over months, at an age where the direction normally only goes one way.
“I know what people will say. I know what I want, and it is here.” Cagliari had the fee agreed and the shirt ready; they did not have the player, and now they will not.
$4.6M was the most the club would pay and Cagliari were asking for more. Deals like this are revived in the last week of a window roughly half the time, and everybody involved knows it.
Josh Doig 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 footballer has an answer to the question about his boyhood club, and most of them never get to act on it. Alfred Gomis has, at Sassuolo, and the first month will show what that does to a man.
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 terraces21 Jun 2027
Sassuolo spend $21.4M on the signing the town wanted
It is the rarest sequence in football: supporters ask for something, and the club goes and does it. $21.4M for Matteo Gabbia, and for one week nobody is complaining about anything.
Loan watchThe goals keep arriving from Agustín Álvarez’s exile
46Edition
The Sassuolo Herald
14 Jun 2027
From our football correspondentUneasy
Transfer targets14 Jun 2027
$21.4M settles it between the clubs for Matteo Gabbia
AC Milan have accepted the money. What Sassuolo do not yet have is the man, and between here and the photograph is a conversation about wages that both sides are dreading.
“It was not right for me. I am not going to explain why to anybody except the people I owe an explanation to.” A deal agreed between two clubs, and a player who declined to be part of it.
Sassuolo have gone to Cagliari with a bid, and the supporters have gone to the internet with an opinion about it. Whether either changes anything is up to the selling club.
The accountants will call it good business and they will be right, which is not the point anybody outside the boardroom is making. Arijanet Murić was one of the reasons people came, and $17.6M does not replace that by itself.
The phone has started ringing about Domenico Berardi again, and this time the name on the line is Ferencvaros. Sassuolo are listening politely and promising nothing.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sassuolo this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad14 Jun 2027
Words at Sassuolo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Sebastiano Esposito 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.
Add another name to the list: Red Bull Salzburg have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Arijanet Murić. The answer from Sassuolo has not changed — yet.
Sassuolo have gone to Catanzaro with a bid, and the supporters have gone to the internet with an opinion about it. Whether either changes anything is up to the selling club.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
Ignace Van Der Brempt 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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Catanzaro have kept their man, and Sassuolo go back to a list with one name crossed off 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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Sassuolo can pretend not to have heard.
18 goals in 28 games at Gornik Zabrze — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Sassuolo updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each 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 Sassuolo this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad31 May 2027
Words at Sassuolo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Domenico Berardi 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 general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Sassuolo, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Sassuolo know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
The terraces31 May 2027
Supporters make their feelings known about Arijanet Murić
The speculation has reached the stands, and the stands have answered. Sassuolo would like this settled before it becomes the only thing anybody asks about.
Rafa Marín 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.
Squad24 May 2027
Words at Sassuolo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Sebastiano Esposito 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 is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Stefano Turati wants continental football; whether Sassuolo can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Sassuolo, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Sassuolo know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Nothing in writing and nothing in public: a word about playing time, given face to face at Sassuolo. The team sheets over the next month will show whether it was worth having.
Sassuolo interviewed the field and appointed the corridor: Pietro Benedetti keeps the job he had been doing in all but title. Sometimes the safest pair of hands is the one already holding the wheel.
The words a physio says slowly. 22 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.
Rafa Marín and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Squad17 May 2027
Words at Sassuolo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Domenico Berardi 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.
7 goals in 14 games at Talleres — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Sassuolo updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
16 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Sassuolo lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
The last league game has been played and the table has stopped moving: 31 points. The summer begins on Monday, and so does the argument about what it all meant.
A defender on the scoresheet, which happens rarely enough that everybody in the ground remembers who took the corner. 1 for him, and a mark of 7.94 for the rest of it.
39 days with the chair empty, a list of names that grows and shrinks by the day, and not one signature on anything. Every week that passes takes the best candidates off 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.
13 clean sheets from 35 appearances at Audace Cerignola. That is the whole of a goalkeeper’s job done properly, and it is being done a long way from the club that owns him.
23 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Sassuolo lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
18 goals in 28 games at Gornik Zabrze — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Sassuolo updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each 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 Sassuolo this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Successful dribbles: 21. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Sebastiano Esposito was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Minute 90, against Cagliari, and a goal that felt like a win to everybody who had stayed. It was a draw. Nobody leaving the ground will describe it as one.
Something was said to Sebastiano Esposito and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
In brief
The dugoutSomebody else is better right now than Nemanja Matić
30 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Sassuolo lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
15 without a win is the sort of run that changes how a town talks about its club, and Cremonese were the afternoon it stopped. Nothing is fixed by one result and everything feels different by one.
Two goals and a mark of 9.09 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Rafa Marín was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Domenico Berardi was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Somebody else has been better, the manager has said so with a team sheet, and there is no argument to be had. He will get the shirt back the only way it can be got back.
The dugout26 Apr 2027
The manager’s verdict
“I am not going to get carried away and I will not let them either. It was a good day. There will be harder ones.” Pietro Benedetti kept it short after the 2‑1 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.
In brief
The dugoutNemanja Matić knocks on the manager's door
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.
Beaten 1‑4 by Genoa, and beaten everywhere it matters. The inquest starts on the training pitch on Monday morning.
Player ratings19 Apr 2027
Vasilije Adžić, 20, plays like he has been here for years — 7.90
A mark of 7.90 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 20-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Rafa Marín was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Domenico Berardi was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 1‑4, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the whole of the defence. 11 saves, several of them the kind nobody expects to see made, and ten outfield players who owe him a drink.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sassuolo 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.
11 days with the chair empty, a list of names that grows and shrinks by the day, and not one signature on anything. Every week that passes takes the best candidates off it.
Perugia will keep picking him until June and will get nothing for him after it. Paolo Bartolomei has pre-agreed a move to Sassuolo, and the only people who lose in that arrangement are the ones who let the contract run down.
3 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Sassuolo can tell you which week it ends in.
Four paragraphs on the club website, none of them about football. The board thanked him, wished him well, and had the search under way before the page went up.
The whole football department in one room on a weekday morning. Nothing was announced afterwards, which is what a board announces when it has run out of patience.
“Somebody picks the team on Saturday. This week it is me, and that is as far as I have thought.” No promises were made in either direction, which is how these usually begin.
18 goals in 28 games at Gornik Zabrze — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Sassuolo updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Domenico Berardi was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Rafa Marín and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
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.
“There are things I liked and things we will be doing on Tuesday until they are right.” 0‑0, and a manager who had already decided what Tuesday looked like.
Rafa Marín 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.
Squad22 Mar 2027
Words at Sassuolo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Sebastiano Esposito 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 is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Stefano Turati wants continental football; whether Sassuolo can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
Somebody else has been better, the manager has said so with a team sheet, and there is no argument to be had. He will get the shirt back the only way it can be got back.
4 call-ups is a compliment to the squad and a headache for the man running it. He will get them back in a fortnight, tired, in various states of repair.
Something was said to Benjamín Domínguez and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sassuolo 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.
11 shut-outs in 27 games. A goalkeeper’s loan is judged on the afternoons when nothing happened at all, and Alessandro Russo has been having a lot of them.
“I watch every Sassuolo game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Palermo runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
The dugout15 Mar 2027
Somebody else is better right now than Nemanja Matić
The team sheet says it in public every week until it changes. The only version of being dropped a footballer cannot argue with, and the one he takes hardest.
9 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 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.
0‑3 to AS Roma, and it was every bit as bad as the number suggests. There are defeats you argue about and defeats you apologise for; this was the second kind.
“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 Sassuolo, and it is not being withdrawn.
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.
The terraces8 Mar 2027
Sassuolo are taken apart by AC Milan — and the town wants answers
It finished 1-8. A cup exit is a disappointment; this was a public dismantling, and the difference between the two is the number of people who will still be talking about it in August.
5 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Sassuolo can tell you which week it ends in.
Rafa Marín and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Squad1 Mar 2027
Words at Sassuolo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Sebastiano Esposito 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.
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.
Rafa Marín 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.
4 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Sassuolo can tell you which week it ends in.
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.
Somebody else has been better, the manager has said so with a team sheet, and there is no argument to be had. He will get the shirt back the only way it can be got back.
Every shape has positions in it and this one does not have his. Sassuolo will either change the shape, change his job, or change his club, and he is waiting to hear which.
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 Sassuolo 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.
3 games without scoring. Strikers stop looking up, midfielders take the extra touch, and every shot that clears the bar is followed by a groan that has been building since the last goal.
200 games in this shirt, through managers and relegations and everything else. Service like it is disappearing from the game and the crowd knows what it is watching.
23 appearances at Audace Cerignola and the goals have stopped going in. Sassuolo lent out a goalkeeper and are watching somebody else’s season get better every week.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 9 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
18 goals in 27 games at Gornik Zabrze — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Sassuolo updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
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.
16 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.
10 clean sheets from 22 appearances at Audace Cerignola. That is the whole of a goalkeeper’s job done properly, and it is being done a long way from the club that owns him.
6 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.
In brief
The dugoutIsmaël Koné dropped after a run of poor form
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Sassuolo can pretend not to have heard.
“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.
Boardroom1 Feb 2027
Sassuolo close the window on a squad of their own making
2 in and 1 out, and no more changes for months. The manager has what he has, the supporters have their opinion of it, and the table will have the last word.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
Sassuolo had done everything except persuade the man himself. He stays at Catanzaro, and the manager goes back to the drawing board with the money still in the bank.
Rafa Marín and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
A shoot-out is remembered by its ending, and this one ends with Stefano Turati: 3 kept out, and a set of supporters who will describe every one of them for the next twenty years.
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
Player ratings25 Jan 2027
Vasilije Adžić, 20, plays like he has been here for years — 7.99
A mark of 7.99 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 20-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
The offer from AS Roma for Edoardo Pieragnolo 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.
Ignace Van Der Brempt and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad25 Jan 2027
Words at Sassuolo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Domenico Berardi 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 6.37 on 10 actions at both ends of the pitch. Midfielders like this get described as unspectacular by people who have never tried to play against one.
Ignace Van Der Brempt and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
The name of Edoardo Pieragnolo has come up in conversations Sassuolo were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Domenico Berardi. 2‑0 against Torino, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Marked 8.32 — 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.
Marked 8.17 — 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 not a grievance and it is not a demand: he wants to play continental football, and he has stopped hiding it. Whether Sassuolo can give him that is a question about the club, not about him.
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.
“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 Sassuolo, and 5 appearances in 19 say he has earned the hearing.
Hellas Verona will want this one forgotten quickly: 3‑0, every duel lost, and a long ride home. Sassuolo were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Armand Laurienté provided it, and the 8.36 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Ignace Van Der Brempt 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.
17 goals in 23 games at Gornik Zabrze — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Sassuolo updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Domenico Berardi was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
8.65. 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.
2 goals before the ground had finished arriving. Hellas Verona spent the rest of the afternoon playing a match that had already been decided, and everybody in the stadium knew 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 Sassuolo this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
16 goals in 22 games at Gornik Zabrze — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Sassuolo updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
Squad4 Jan 2027
Words at Sassuolo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Domenico Berardi 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 mornings you wake up and you are still a long way from everything you know.” It is not the football and it never was; Sassuolo are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Successful dribbles: 22. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
Squad28 Dec 2026
Nemanja Matić 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.
Half the programme played, position 16, 14 on the board. Doubling it is the sum every supporter has done and the only one nobody at the club will do out loud.
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.
The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.
Ignace Van Der Brempt and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
“I watch every Sassuolo game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Palermo runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
Ignace Van Der Brempt 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 22 and the ground already sings his name, which is a thing that happens to local boys and almost never to signings. Everything from here is measured against an affection he did nothing to earn except be from here.
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Sassuolo told Federico Bonazzoli something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Sassuolo heard it as anything 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 Sassuolo 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.
Squad7 Dec 2026
Words at Sassuolo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Sebastiano Esposito 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 easiest signature of my career.” Giovanni Chiricallo and Sassuolo agree another 3 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 0‑1, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
The demotion a club never announces and a dressing room always notices. Kieron Bowie is further from the side than he was, and the reason will not be given until he asks.
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.
Josh Doig was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Domenico Berardi was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 0‑5, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
Somebody else has been better, the manager has said so with a team sheet, and there is no argument to be had. He will get the shirt back the only way it can be got back.
In brief
The dugoutNemanja Matić asks for a word with the manager
The terracesEverybody has an opinion about Arijanet Murić
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sassuolo this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad23 Nov 2026
Words at Sassuolo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Domenico Berardi 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.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Jacopo Schiavone after 1‑2, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation Sassuolo are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.
Ignace Van Der Brempt 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.
Squad16 Nov 2026
Words at Sassuolo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Sebastiano Esposito 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 particular warmth a ground reserves for a 20-year-old it feels ownership of. Vasilije Adžić 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.
Marked 8.16 — 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.
Two goals and a mark of 8.22 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sassuolo this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
6 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Sassuolo and Gubbio in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
Squad9 Nov 2026
Words at Sassuolo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Domenico Berardi 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 22 and the ground already sings his name, which is a thing that happens to local boys and almost never to signings. Everything from here is measured against an affection he did nothing to earn except be from here.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
Jay Idzes and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad2 Nov 2026
Words at Sassuolo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Domenico Berardi 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 are things I liked and things we will be doing on Tuesday until they are right.” 1‑1, and a manager who had already decided what Tuesday looked like.
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Josh Doig wants continental football; whether Sassuolo can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
Ignace Van Der Brempt and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
11 new signings in one window. Every one may be an upgrade and the side can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild the verdicts never mention.
The dugout26 Oct 2026
The manager’s verdict
“That is on me. I pick the team and I picked wrong.” Managers say that when they mean it and when they need to be seen to, and after 0‑2 Jacopo Schiavone left the room before anybody could ask which.
Ignace Van Der Brempt 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.
Squad19 Oct 2026
Arijanet Murić has improved at 27, which nobody expected
Careers are supposed to plateau and then decline, and the players who ignore that are always the ones who were listening on the training ground. 3 points of it, over months, at an age where the direction normally only goes one way.
Squad19 Oct 2026
Words at Sassuolo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Domenico Berardi 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 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 point is a point and I will take it, but we should have had all three.” Jacopo Schiavone after the 0‑0 draw, and the sentence every manager in the country said at some stage this weekend.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sassuolo 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 training ground goes quiet for a fortnight. 4 men have gone off to be somebody else’s players, and the manager is left with the ones nobody has called.
“It is not the end of the world and it is not good enough. Both of those are true.” The manager, after a 1‑1 draw, said the honest thing and then went to say it again inside.
8 goals in 11 games at Gornik Zabrze — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Sassuolo updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
In brief
The dugoutAster Vranckx dropped after a run of poor form
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.
Ignace Van Der Brempt and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Words at Sassuolo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Sebastiano Esposito 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 chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 3 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
The door stayed shut a long time after the final whistle. What was said in there is between them; whether it worked is between them and Saturday.
The dugout5 Oct 2026
The view from the dugout
“We will look at it, we will learn from it, and we go again.” The three sentences every manager keeps for a 0‑3 defeat, delivered by Jacopo Schiavone to a room that had heard them before.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the whole of the defence. 10 saves, several of them the kind nobody expects to see made, and ten outfield players who owe him a drink.
0‑3 to Inter, and it was every bit as bad as the number suggests. There are defeats you argue about and defeats you apologise for; this was the second kind.
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.
Ignace Van Der Brempt and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
10 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.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Jacopo Schiavone after 0‑3, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
20 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Sassuolo lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 9 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 Sassuolo this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Sassuolo, and both men came out saying it was fine.
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.
“It is not the end of the world and it is not good enough. Both of those are true.” The manager, after a 0‑0 draw, said the honest thing and then went to say it again inside.
The words a physio says slowly. 27 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 offer from Inhulets for Denis Şandro 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.
The deal that would have taken Edoardo Pieragnolo to Cagliari has collapsed at the last stage, and he reports back to Sassuolo 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 Sassuolo this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Words at Sassuolo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Sebastiano Esposito 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.
Sassuolo asked and Cesena said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
35 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Sassuolo lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
The deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 4 arrived, 6 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed one.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Juve Stabia have kept their man, and Sassuolo go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Ignace Van Der Brempt and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Domenico Berardi was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Add another name to the list: Bari have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Edoardo Pieragnolo. The answer from Sassuolo has not changed — yet.
Squad31 Aug 2026
8 new faces, and Sassuolo 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.
This is not cover and nobody is pretending it is. $13.2M has been paid because Federico Bonazzoli is straightforwardly better than what was already here, and the club has decided to stop waiting.
Sassuolo asked and Everton said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Lazio wanted more than $11.0M and the board would not go there. Walked away, for now, which in a transfer window means until somebody blinks.
Player ratings24 Aug 2026
Vasilije Adžić, 20, plays like he has been here for years — 7.72
A mark of 7.72 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 20-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Ignace Van Der Brempt 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.
Boards get told what they have done wrong for years and hear nothing on the days they get it right. This is one of those days: Federico Bonazzoli from Cremonese for $13.2M, and a ticket office having a very good morning.
$13.2M on the table at Cremonese. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
He is going to Pescara, the club has $10.6M it did not have on Friday, and the phone-ins have already decided how they feel about that. Selling well and selling somebody they loved are not the same skill.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sassuolo this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad17 Aug 2026
Words at Sassuolo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Domenico Berardi 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 phone has started ringing about Simone Cinquegrano again, and this time the name on the line is Avellino. Sassuolo are listening politely and promising nothing.
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation Sassuolo are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Napoli have kept their man, and Sassuolo go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Pescara waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Sassuolo is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
There comes a point where a club either backs its own ambition or admits it does not have any. Sassuolo have paid $7.9M for Abdelhamid Sabiri, which is the loudest way there is of saying which one it chose.
Sassuolo have gone to Arezzo with a bid, and the supporters have gone to the internet with an opinion about it. Whether either changes anything is up to the selling club.
The offer from Hellas Verona for Giacomo Satalino 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.
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: Porto keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
Trento paid $1.4M and Sassuolo took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
Ignace Van Der Brempt and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
$7.9M on the table at Fiorentina. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
Nemanja Matić and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.