Two goals and a mark of 10.00 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.81 at 34, and nobody on the pitch was better.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
It finished 6‑4, and it was Haris Berbić’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Slovan Liberec.
Squad13 Sep 2038
Words at Slovan Liberec training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Petr Juliš 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.
10 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Slovan Liberec and Slovacko in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
The words a physio says slowly. 19 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.80 at 34, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Lukáš Mašek was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Raimonds Krollis and Slovan Liberec agree another 2 years.
“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 words a physio says slowly. 28 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.
At 36 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 9.29 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Slovan Liberec 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 Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Player ratings30 Aug 2038
Haris Berbić was on a different afternoon to everybody else
10.00. 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.
Everyone has stopped pretending: Slovacko will make the call about Szymon Weirauch this week. Slovan Liberec have a number in mind, and the number is not shy.
36 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Slovan Liberec lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
There is exactly one of these per career and it does not usually go like this. 1 on the scoresheet, 8.42 beside the name, and a crowd that had never seen him before chanting it by the end.
At 34 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.92 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad23 Aug 2038
Petr Juliš 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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 19-year-old it feels ownership of. Ondrej Provod 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 words a physio says slowly. 44 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Raimonds Krollis provided it, and the 8.41 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
At 35 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.50 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad16 Aug 2038
Words at Slovan Liberec training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Petr Juliš 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 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Slovan Liberec and Jablonec in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
Marked 8.93 — 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 words a physio says slowly. 51 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Two or more conceded in each of the last 8 matches. It is not one mistake repeating itself, which would be the easier thing to fix; it is a different one every week.
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.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.19 at 36, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Lukáš Mašek 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 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.
Marked 8.71 — 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 words a physio says slowly. 58 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.75 at 34, and nobody on the pitch was better.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Slavia Prague will keep picking him until June and will get nothing for him after it. Cameron Eubank has pre-agreed a move to Slovan Liberec, and the only people who lose in that arrangement are the ones who let the contract run down.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 10 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
The words a physio says slowly. 65 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.
Lukáš Mašek 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.
Two or more conceded in each of the last 6 matches. It is not one mistake repeating itself, which would be the easier thing to fix; it is a different one every week.
Squad26 Jul 2038
Petr Juliš falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
He 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.
The words a physio says slowly. 72 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Slovan Liberec moved before anybody else could: a new deal for Vaclav Darida, agreed quietly and announced loudly. Boards extend managers for many reasons; the good one is the one this looks like.
7 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.
Squad19 Jul 2038
Elián Encina 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.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Patrik Cerny 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. Petr Cerny 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. Jiri Stanek 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.
80 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Slovan Liberec lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Lukáš Mašek 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 nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Slovan Liberec can pretend not to have heard.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 19 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
88 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Slovan Liberec lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
The board’s statement ran to three sentences and one of them mentioned results. Vaclav Darida has managed long enough to translate: win soon, or the next statement is shorter.
“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 Slovan Liberec, and it is not being withdrawn.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Szymon Weirauch will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Slovan Liberec the goodbyes have quietly begun.
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Elián Encina wants continental football; whether Slovan Liberec can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad5 Jul 2038
Petr Juliš 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.
None of them will be seen by anybody outside the training ground for three years, most of them will never play a senior match, and one of them might change the club. That is the whole proposition, and it is why academies exist.
The words a physio says slowly. 96 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Slovan Liberec they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad28 Jun 2038
Elián Encina 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.
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.
Nobody upstairs has said anything, which is the loudest thing they could do. Results buy silence in this game; the account at Slovan Liberec is running low.
“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 Slovan Liberec, and it is not being withdrawn.
The injury that keeps coming back, keeps being rushed back from, and quietly costs more careers than the dramatic ones. 15 days is the estimate; the honest figure depends on whether anybody is patient.
Lukáš Mašek 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.
Squad21 Jun 2038
Petr Juliš 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.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Slovan Liberec can pretend not to have heard.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad14 Jun 2038
Words at Slovan Liberec training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Petr Juliš is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Nothing happens for months and then he simply arrives, at no cost, having signed a pre-contract while still turning out for somebody else. It is the least dramatic way to sign a footballer and frequently the shrewdest.
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and Slovan Liberec know 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.
“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 Slovan Liberec, and it is not being withdrawn.
“The easiest signature of my career.” Šimon Gabriel and Slovan Liberec agree another 2 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Lukáš Mašek 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.
Squad7 Jun 2038
Words at Slovan Liberec training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Elián Encina is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Nothing happens for months and then he simply arrives, at no cost, having signed a pre-contract while still turning out for somebody else. It is the least dramatic way to sign a footballer and frequently the shrewdest.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad31 May 2038
Words at Slovan Liberec training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Petr Juliš 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 injury that keeps coming back, keeps being rushed back from, and quietly costs more careers than the dramatic ones. 14 days is the estimate; the honest figure depends on whether anybody is patient.
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.
Nobody upstairs has said anything, which is the loudest thing they could do. Results buy silence in this game; the account at Slovan Liberec is running low.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Ladislav Almási provided it, and the 7.81 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.90 at 34, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Lukáš Mašek 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.
Two or more conceded in each of the last 5 matches. It is not one mistake repeating itself, which would be the easier thing to fix; it is a different one every week.
7 goals in one match, Ladislav Almási on the scoresheet, and a scoreline that will look like a misprint. Neutrals could not have asked more of Slovan Liberec and Slavia Prague.
Squad24 May 2038
Petr Juliš falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
The words a physio says slowly. 18 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.
Qëndrim Zyba was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Squad17 May 2038
Elián Encina 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.
In brief
SquadLukáš Mašek has become a man the manager trusts
26 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Slovan Liberec lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Lukáš Mašek 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 nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Slovan Liberec can pretend not to have heard.
Squad10 May 2038
Petr Juliš 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.
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.
33 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Slovan Liberec lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
The board’s statement ran to three sentences and one of them mentioned results. Vaclav Darida 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 Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
40 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Slovan Liberec lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Slovan Liberec have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
47 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Slovan Liberec lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Slovan Liberec 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 Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
In brief
SquadWords at Slovan Liberec training over how hard people work
54 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Slovan Liberec lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad12 Apr 2038
Petr Juliš 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.
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.
Every long career reaches the week the player starts thinking about the last one. He would like it to be at the club that first put him on a pitch, and Slovan Liberec now know that too.
61 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Slovan Liberec lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
“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 Slovan Liberec, 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 Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The shirt still fits. Tadeáš Vachoušek is back at Slovan Liberec, and half the ground remembers him in these colours already. Some signings need selling to the town; this one sold itself.
Squad5 Apr 2038
Elián Encina 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.
Banik Ostrava will keep picking him until June and will get nothing for him after it. Matteo Anzolin has pre-agreed a move to Slovan Liberec, and the only people who lose in that arrangement are the ones who let the contract run down.
The words a physio says slowly. 69 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 words a physio says slowly. 76 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad22 Mar 2038
Words at Slovan Liberec training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Petr Juliš 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 words a physio says slowly. 83 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.
Lukáš Mašek 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 long career reaches the week the player starts thinking about the last one. He would like it to be at the club that first put him on a pitch, and Slovan Liberec now know that too.
Squad15 Mar 2038
Words at Slovan Liberec training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Elián Encina 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.
91 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Slovan Liberec lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
60 appearances across 10 seasons in one shirt. Nobody builds a career like that on purpose any more; it happens to a certain kind of footballer at a certain kind of club.
The words a physio says slowly. 99 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.
Lukáš Mašek 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 the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Elián Encina wants continental football; whether Slovan Liberec can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and Slovan Liberec know it.
The words a physio says slowly. 106 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.34 at 34, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Qëndrim Zyba was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
The words a physio says slowly. 113 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.
Lukáš Mašek 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.
Squad15 Feb 2038
Petr Juliš 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.
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.
2 goals to the good, and then a slow surrender of everything that had been earned. Lukáš Mašek will not be the one blamed for it, but nobody at Slovan Liberec escapes the conversation that follows a collapse like this.
Two goals and a mark of 9.10 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
291 appearances across 12 seasons in one shirt. Nobody builds a career like that on purpose any more; it happens to a certain kind of footballer at a certain kind of club.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Slovan Liberec can pretend not to have heard.
Everything was agreed until it was not, and Szymon Weirauch reports back to Slovan Liberec with a summer to forget. Neither club is saying who walked away from the table.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Benjamin Nyarko provided it, and the 8.44 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
290 appearances across 12 seasons in one shirt. Nobody builds a career like that on purpose any more; it happens to a certain kind of footballer at a certain kind of club.
Nobody upstairs has said anything, which is the loudest thing they could do. Results buy silence in this game; the account at Slovan Liberec is running low.
Lukáš Mašek 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.
Defending was optional and nobody took up the option. 8 goals between Slovan Liberec and Banik Ostrava, and not one of the people who paid to be there will ask for the money back.
Squad1 Feb 2038
Words at Slovan Liberec training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Elián Encina is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
0‑3 to Dukla Prague, 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Slovan Liberec they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad25 Jan 2038
Words at Slovan Liberec training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Petr Juliš 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.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Slovan Liberec know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
There were 86 minutes on the clock and Zlin had all but banked the point. Football rarely reads the room, and Slovan Liberec did not stop to explain themselves.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 9.23 at 33, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Lukáš Mašek 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.
Squad18 Jan 2038
Petr Juliš 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.
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.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 8 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Ladislav Almási provided it, and the 8.43 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.84 at 34, and nobody on the pitch was better.
A 3‑1 win over Sigma Olomouc, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Nothing happens for months and then he simply arrives, at no cost, having signed a pre-contract while still turning out for somebody else. It is the least dramatic way to sign a footballer and frequently the shrewdest.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Slovan Liberec can pretend not to have heard.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.89 at 34, and nobody on the pitch was better.
There are footballers who have a good season and footballers a season is remembered for, and the second kind get their names read out in a hall in the summer. Slovan Liberec will be quietly delighted and privately nervous.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
1‑4 to Viktoria Plzen, 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.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 8 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.88 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 Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
Squad28 Dec 2037
Words at Slovan Liberec training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Petr Juliš 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.
2 goals to the good, and then a slow surrender of everything that had been earned. Haris Berbić will not be the one blamed for it, but nobody at Slovan Liberec escapes the conversation that follows a collapse like this.
At 34 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.52 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad21 Dec 2037
Words at Slovan Liberec training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Elián Encina 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.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.10 at 34, and nobody on the pitch was better.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad14 Dec 2037
Words at Slovan Liberec training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Petr Juliš 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.
321 appearances across 13 seasons in one shirt. Nobody builds a career like that on purpose any more; it happens to a certain kind of footballer at a certain kind of club.
Lukáš Mašek 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: Ladislav Almási. 3‑1 against Teplice, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.91 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
Squad30 Nov 2037
Elián Encina 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.
Player ratings30 Nov 2037
Haris Berbić was on a different afternoon to everybody else
9.23. 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.
Conceding is one thing; the response is what tells you about a dressing room. Lukáš Mašek had Slovan Liberec level again within 4 minutes, and Zbrojovka Brno never got to play with a lead at all.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 11 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
At 34 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.43 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Lukáš Mašek 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.
11 goals and a season average of 7.43. Form like that gets noticed well beyond this town.
Squad23 Nov 2037
Petr Juliš falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Marked 9.01 — 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.
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.
Qëndrim Zyba 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 2037
Words at Slovan Liberec training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Petr Juliš 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.
15 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
“The easiest signature of my career.” Šimon Gabriel and Slovan Liberec agree another 2 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Lukáš Mašek 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 2037
Words at Slovan Liberec training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Elián Encina 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 9.16 — 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.
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Slovan Liberec hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Qëndrim Zyba 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.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Slovan Liberec know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 8 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
14 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
28 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
Lukáš Mašek 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.
10 goals in one match, Elián Encina on the scoresheet, and a scoreline that will look like a misprint. Neutrals could not have asked more of Slovan Liberec and Banik Ostrava.
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Šimon Gabriel, and the manager let it.
Squad19 Oct 2037
Words at Slovan Liberec training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Elián Encina is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Marked 8.14 — 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.
There is no crueller way to lose a football match. Slovan Liberec scored in the 95th minute, the restart barely happened, and the away end was still standing when the whistle went.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.53 at 35, 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 Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad12 Oct 2037
Words at Slovan Liberec training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Petr Juliš is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Haris Berbić. 3‑2 against Dukla Prague, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Player ratings12 Oct 2037
Haris Berbić was on a different afternoon to everybody else
9.36. 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 9.08 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
“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; Slovan Liberec are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 7 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Slovan Liberec can pretend not to have heard.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 9.10 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Lukáš Mašek 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.
Squad5 Oct 2037
Petr Juliš 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.
13 shots, and a count that reads like a good afternoon until you check the other column. Strikers survive weeks like this on the understanding that the chances keep arriving; the day they stop is the day it becomes a problem.
At 35 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 9.22 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Slovan Liberec have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Qëndrim Zyba 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 Sep 2037
Elián Encina falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Marked 9.24 — 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 8.90 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
At 35 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.59 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Lukáš Mašek 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.
11 matches unbeaten here. Every visiting manager is asked about it in the week before, which is precisely why it keeps going.
Squad21 Sep 2037
Petr Juliš falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
A 3‑1 win over Bohemians 1905, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 9.12 at 35, and nobody on the pitch was better.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Slovan Liberec have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
The deal that would have taken Ondřej Mastný to Slovacko has collapsed at the last stage, and he reports back to Slovan Liberec with a summer to forget and a season still to play. Nobody is saying which side walked away.
Qëndrim Zyba 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.
9 goals in one match, Raimonds Krollis on the scoresheet, and a scoreline that will look like a misprint. Neutrals could not have asked more of Slovan Liberec and Viktoria Plzen.
Squad14 Sep 2037
Words at Slovan Liberec training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Petr Juliš 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. 7 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
361 appearances across 12 seasons in one shirt. Nobody builds a career like that on purpose any more; it happens to a certain kind of footballer at a certain kind of club.
At 34 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.22 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Lukáš Mašek 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.
8 goals in one match, Haris Berbić on the scoresheet, and a scoreline that will look like a misprint. Neutrals could not have asked more of Slovan Liberec and Slovacko.
The words a physio says slowly. 18 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad31 Aug 2037
Words at Slovan Liberec training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Petr Juliš 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.
Everyone has stopped pretending: Teplice will make the call about Ondřej Mastný this week. Slovan Liberec have a number in mind, and the number is not shy.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Slovan Liberec know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
26 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Slovan Liberec lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
The 86th minute, half the ground already edging towards the exits, and Petr Holes decided nobody was going anywhere. Teplice had no time left to answer.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.21 at 34, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Lukáš Mašek 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 the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Elián Encina wants continental football; whether Slovan Liberec can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
The words a physio says slowly. 34 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.
At 35 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.22 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Successful dribbles: 21. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Player ratings17 Aug 2037
Haris Berbić was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.78. 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.
10 shots, and a count that reads like a good afternoon until you check the other column. Strikers survive weeks like this on the understanding that the chances keep arriving; the day they stop is the day it becomes a problem.
The words a physio says slowly. 41 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Ladislav Almási provided it, and the 8.60 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 9.39 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 Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
At 31 the improving is meant to be over. It is not: 3 points better than the mark taken at the start of the year, which is the sort of thing that happens to players who take the boring parts of the job seriously.
6 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Slovan Liberec and Jablonec in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
Squad10 Aug 2037
Petr Juliš 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.
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.
At 38 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 9.51 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
353 appearances across 12 seasons in one shirt. Nobody builds a career like that on purpose any more; it happens to a certain kind of footballer at a certain kind of club.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“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.
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.
6 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Slovan Liberec and Slavia Prague in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.79 at 33, and nobody on the pitch was better.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Slovan Liberec can pretend not to have heard.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Slovan Liberec can pretend not to have heard.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 9.17 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
A new deal for the man in the dugout, and the clearest thing a board can say without calling a press conference about it. Stability is cheap to promise and expensive to deliver.
Squad20 Jul 2037
Words at Slovan Liberec training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Petr Juliš 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.
9 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. Patrik Sima is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Lukáš Mašek was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
At 31 the improving is meant to be over. It is not: 3 points better than the mark taken at the start of the year, which is the sort of thing that happens to players who take the boring parts of the job seriously.
In brief
SquadPetr Juliš falls out with a teammate over standards
286 appearances across 11 seasons in one shirt. Nobody builds a career like that on purpose any more; it happens to a certain kind of footballer at a certain kind of club.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Slovan Liberec 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 Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
7 arrivals, an average age nobody would call a squad, and a set of parents being shown around a building their sons will spend more time in than at home. The scouting has already happened; today is only the paperwork.
Marc Aguado is 37 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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Slovan Liberec can pretend not to have heard.
Lukáš Mašek 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 clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Slovan Liberec is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad29 Jun 2037
Petr Juliš 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.
It is sentimental, it is completely genuine, and it is the beginning of a departure nobody has announced. The club can be gracious about it or it can pretend not to have heard.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
“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 Slovan Liberec, and it is not being withdrawn.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Slovan Liberec they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
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.
Qëndrim Zyba 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 Jun 2037
Words at Slovan Liberec training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Petr Juliš 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. 19 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Lukáš Mašek 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.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Josef Hruška and Slovan Liberec agree another 3 years.
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Slovan Liberec has been clear about where Andrej Đokanović stands, which is more than many ever get.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 26 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
166 appearances across 11 seasons in one shirt. Nobody builds a career like that on purpose any more; it happens to a certain kind of footballer at a certain kind of club.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Josef Hruška is living that version at Slovan Liberec, and it tends to show in the first month.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Petr Hodouš and Slovan Liberec agree another 2 years.
The shirt still fits. Josef Hruška is back at Slovan Liberec, and half the ground remembers him in these colours already. Some signings need selling to the town; this one sold itself.
Nothing happens for months and then he simply arrives, at no cost, having signed a pre-contract while still turning out for somebody else. It is the least dramatic way to sign a footballer and frequently the shrewdest.
The words a physio says slowly. 17 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Slovan Liberec 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 Slovan Liberec, and it is not being withdrawn.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Slovan Liberec they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
The words a physio says slowly. 24 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 42 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 Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The words a physio says slowly. 31 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Slovan Liberec will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Lukáš Mašek 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
SquadPetr Juliš falls out with a teammate over standards
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.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Slovan Liberec 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 Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
In brief
SquadWords at Slovan Liberec training over how hard people work
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Slovan Liberec 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. Ondřej Mastný will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Slovan Liberec the goodbyes have quietly begun.
“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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Slovan Liberec 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 Slovan Liberec 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 Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Alec Van Hoorenbeeck will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Slovan Liberec the goodbyes have quietly begun.
In brief
SquadWords at Slovan Liberec training over how hard people work
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 79 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Elián Encina wants continental football; whether Slovan Liberec can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
In brief
SquadPetr Juliš 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. 86 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.” Slovan Liberec 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 Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
In brief
SquadWords at Slovan Liberec training over how hard people work
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Slovan Liberec will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Šimon Gabriel and Slovan Liberec agree another 2 years.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Slovan Liberec 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.” Slovan Liberec 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 Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
18 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Slovan Liberec lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Lukáš Mašek was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
In brief
Boardroom102% of the income goes out in wages at Slovan Liberec
25 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Slovan Liberec lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Qëndrim Zyba 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 Slovan Liberec 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.” Slovan Liberec have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Lukáš Mašek 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.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Slovan Liberec have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Lukáš Mašek and Slovan Liberec agree another 3 years.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Slovan Liberec they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Lukáš Mašek 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.
Squad23 Feb 2037
Petr Juliš 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.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
Squad16 Feb 2037
Words at Slovan Liberec training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Petr Juliš 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 Marek Icha signs something — a contract at Slovan Liberec or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.10 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Slovan Liberec is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad9 Feb 2037
Words at Slovan Liberec training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Ivan Krajčírik 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 keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Slovan Liberec, another week without a signature from David Nykrín.
At 35 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 9.04 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
304 appearances across 12 seasons in one shirt. Nobody builds a career like that on purpose any more; it happens to a certain kind of footballer at a certain kind of club.
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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Slovan Liberec can pretend not to have heard.
Lukáš Mašek 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.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Alec Van Hoorenbeeck will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Slovan Liberec the goodbyes have quietly begun.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Slovan Liberec heard it as anything else.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.29 at 33, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Qëndrim Zyba was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
There is a figure at which a wage bill stops being ambitious and becomes the reason nothing else is possible, and this club has reached it. Nothing is left over for a transfer, a stand or a rainy afternoon.
Player ratingsThe one thing Afolabi Soliu could not do
547Edition
The Slovan Liberec Post
19 Jan 2037
From our football correspondentTriumph
Player ratings19 Jan 2037
A brace, and Petr Juliš takes the afternoon — 8.82
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Petr Juliš provided it, and the 8.82 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.71 at 34, and nobody on the pitch was better.
5 wins on the spin now, and the question has changed from whether the run ends to who ends it. Confidence like this cannot be bought; it has to be earned exactly this way.
Lukáš Mašek 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.
19 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Slovan Liberec lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Lukáš Mašek was on a different afternoon to everybody else
10.00. 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 ratings12 Jan 2037
Adam Krejci was on a different afternoon to everybody else
9.93. 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.
Defending was optional and nobody took up the option. 9 goals between Slovan Liberec and Sigma Olomouc, and not one of the people who paid to be there will ask for the money back.
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.
Two goals and a mark of 9.28 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Ladislav Almási provided it, and the 8.57 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
At 34 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.60 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Lukáš Mašek 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 easiest signature of my career.” Vojtěch Stránský and Slovan Liberec agree another 2 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
The words a physio says slowly. 34 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 Slovan Liberec will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Two goals and a mark of 9.04 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 9.12 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
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.
9 goals in one match, Elián Encina on the scoresheet, and a scoreline that will look like a misprint. Neutrals could not have asked more of Slovan Liberec and Viktoria Plzen.
42 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Slovan Liberec lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Slovan Liberec will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
At 37 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.25 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
6 goals in one match, Lukáš Mašek on the scoresheet, and a scoreline that will look like a misprint. Neutrals could not have asked more of Slovan Liberec and Slovacko.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Lukáš Mašek. 4‑2 against Slovacko, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
49 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Slovan Liberec lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Slovan Liberec 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 Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
Shots: 12. 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.
56 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Slovan Liberec lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Slovan Liberec will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.39 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
402 appearances across 11 seasons in one shirt. Nobody builds a career like that on purpose any more; it happens to a certain kind of footballer at a certain kind of club.
6 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Slovan Liberec and Teplice in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
Successful dribbles: 20. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Player ratings8 Dec 2036
Lukáš Mašek was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.38. 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.
65 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Slovan Liberec lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Slovan Liberec will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
401 appearances across 11 seasons in one shirt. Nobody builds a career like that on purpose any more; it happens to a certain kind of footballer at a certain kind of club.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Slovan Liberec 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.
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.
72 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Slovan Liberec lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 53 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
The 89th minute, half the ground already edging towards the exits, and Haris Berbić decided nobody was going anywhere. Jablonec had no time left to answer.
At 36 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.76 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Marked 9.75 — 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.
79 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Slovan Liberec lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Two goals and a mark of 8.36 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Slovan Liberec will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
At 35 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.55 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Slovan Liberec this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Defending was optional and nobody took up the option. 10 goals between Slovan Liberec and Slavia Prague, and not one of the people who paid to be there will ask for the money back.
Squad17 Nov 2036
Words at Slovan Liberec training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Qëndrim Zyba 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.
86 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Slovan Liberec lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Lukáš Mašek 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.
Squad10 Nov 2036
Petr Juliš falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Marked 9.29 — 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.
Shots: 6. 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.
The words a physio says slowly. 94 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 10 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Player ratings3 Nov 2036
A brace, and Haris Berbić takes the afternoon — 9.29
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Haris Berbić provided it, and the 9.29 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Slovan Liberec have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.30 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
“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.
Marked 9.33 — 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.
102 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Slovan Liberec lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 10 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.65 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Lukáš Mašek 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.
Squad27 Oct 2036
Qëndrim Zyba 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.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Slovan Liberec know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
109 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Slovan Liberec lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 11 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
At 37 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 7.82 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Qëndrim Zyba 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.
Squad20 Oct 2036
Words at Slovan Liberec training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Petr Juliš 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.