Position 16 and 10 points, and the table gets read bottom-up in this part of town. The calendar has stopped being a schedule and started being a countdown.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Kyriakos Savvidis was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Marin Karamarko and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Somebody else has been better, the manager has said so with a team sheet, and there is no argument to be had. He will get the shirt back the only way it can be got back.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Deni Jurić signs something — a contract at Wisła Płock or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
In brief
The dugoutGleb Kuchko has become a man the manager trusts
“I was told what my role would be, and I signed on that basis. It has not happened.” A grievance with a date attached is the hardest kind to settle.
Squad26 Oct 2026
Saïd Hamulić 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.
9 signings in three months. Every one of them may be an upgrade and the team can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild that never appears in the transfer-window verdicts.
The dugout26 Oct 2026
The manager’s verdict
“I am not going to get carried away and I will not let them either. It was a good day. There will be harder ones.” Michal Grosicki kept it short after the 1‑0 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Saïd Hamulić’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Wisła Płock needing him to play as if none of it matters.
A 2‑1 win over Ruch, a place in the next round, and the quiet arithmetic every supporter does on the walk home: how many more until a final?
Player ratings19 Oct 2026
Bartosz Borowski, 19, plays like he has been here for years — 8.03
A mark of 8.03 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 19-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 21 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Saïd Hamulić was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Kyriakos Savvidis 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 21 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Wisła Płock they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
At 19 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.
Squad12 Oct 2026
Words at Wisła Płock training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Kyriakos Savvidis 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.
Marin Karamarko 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. Wisła Płock know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Wisła Płock, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Numbers do not stay secret in a dressing room and never have. He is not asking for more than he is worth; he is asking why somebody beside him is worth more, and at Wisła Płock that is a harder question to answer.
A conversation in the manager’s office, and a commitment that came out of it. Promises like that are cheap to make and expensive to break, and Dani Pacheco has written the date down.
“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 Wisła Płock know it.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Words at Wisła Płock training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Saïd Hamulić 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.
Player ratings5 Oct 2026
Jime was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.02. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
A point taken on 89 minutes is worth exactly one point and considerably more than that to a dressing room. This side does not stop, which is a reputation worth more than the result.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Marcin Kamiński and Wisła Płock agree another 1 years.
Giannis Niarchos was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Every club 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 it has been tried.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Dominik Sarapata is 18, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Saïd Hamulić was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Kyriakos Savvidis and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Marked 6.90 on 9 actions at both ends of the pitch. Midfielders like this get described as unspectacular by people who have never tried to play against one.
Successful dribbles: 16. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad28 Sep 2026
9 new faces, and Wisła Płock are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 0‑3, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
200 games in the shirt. Nobody sets out to build a record like that; it happens to a certain kind of player at a certain kind of club, and this town knows what it has.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Kyriakos Savvidis was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Wisła Płock this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Successful dribbles: 17. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 0‑1, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
The one version of being left out a player cannot argue with, and the one he takes worst. Somebody else has been better and the team sheet says so, in public, every week until it changes.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Joaquín signs something — a contract at Wisła Płock or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
The shape wanted a different profile against this opponent, which is a real football answer and no comfort at all to the man it is about. He did nothing wrong and he did not play.
Two goals and a mark of 8.92 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Wisła Płock they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Saïd Hamulić 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.
Wisła Płock asked and Montevideo City Torque said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
A 2‑1 win over Gornik Zabrze, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
At 23 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
“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 Wisła Płock, and it is not being withdrawn.
Boardroom7 Sep 2026
Deadline passes with 17 signed and 16 gone
That is the business done at Wisła Płock until the window opens again. Whether it was enough will be answered on Saturdays rather than in a column, and the first Saturday is close.
Squad7 Sep 2026
Saïd Hamulić 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.
Marin Karamarko and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
The manager has re-ordered his thinking and Marin Karamarko has come out of it lower. He will be told it is temporary, and the players who have heard that before will avoid his eye.
Gornik Zabrze next, and one man in the Wisła Płock dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought of him.
It will be explained as a change for the team and it may even be one. Nobody who has worn one believes that, and neither does the man who has just had it taken away.
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Wisła Płock people have started saying his name in the past tense.
“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 Wisła Płock, and it is not being withdrawn.
5 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Kyriakos Savvidis was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Wisła Płock can pretend not to have heard.
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at Dynamo Kyiv is saying, and nobody at Wisła Płock is enjoying the guessing.
Wisła Płock offered $24.0K; GKS Katowice said it was not close. The manager will be told the money is still there for the right player, which is what managers are told.
Squad24 Aug 2026
Saïd Hamulić 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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Shakhtar have kept their man, and Wisła Płock go back to a list with one name crossed off 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 Wisła Płock this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Oliwier Szymoniak is living that version at Wisła Płock, and it tends to show in the first month.
The number the board signed off was not enough. It has been asked again and raised its own offer to $25.0K — a club that wants Bartosz Jaroszek enough to be asked twice.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Wisła Płock have done the hard part with Dynamo Kyiv, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
Successful dribbles: 23. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
The offer went to GKS Katowice this week and it is theirs to answer. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loud the door closes.
Squad17 Aug 2026
Words at Wisła Płock training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Saïd Hamulić 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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Polonia Warszawa have kept their man, and Wisła Płock go back to a list with one name crossed off 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 Wisła Płock this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Every footballer has an answer to the question about his boyhood club, and most of them never get to act on it. Joaquín has, at Wisła Płock, and the first month will show what that does to a man.
The clubs have shaken hands with Gornik Zabrze; the player has not yet. Personal terms are next, and personal terms are where more deals die than anybody prints.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Wieczysta Kraków have kept their man, and Wisła Płock go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Jakub Klich has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Robert Szymanski has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Kamil Jozwiak is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Adam Buksa has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
The offer from Smorgon for Gleb Kuchko was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Saïd Hamulić was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Bartosz Borowski 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.
Still no offer on the table, and Saïd Hamulić’s deal keeps shrinking. In boardroom language, silence this long stops being an oversight and starts being an answer.
6 new signings in one window. Every one may be an upgrade and the side can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild the verdicts never mention.