Marked for Siebe Horemans
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Transfer targets31 Aug 2026
The paperwork begins on Dani de Wit
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. PSV have done the hard part with Utrecht, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
Market31 Aug 2026
The paperwork is done: Siebe Horemans joins from Utrecht in a deal worth $9.5M. Now comes the harder part.
Player ratings31 Aug 2026
Both of them Guus Til's — 8.53
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 8.53, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
Transfer targets31 Aug 2026
$4.3M was the most the club would pay and Utrecht were asking for more. Deals like this are revived in the last week of a window roughly half the time, and everybody involved knows it.
Market31 Aug 2026
“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 The request is on a desk at PSV, and it is not being withdrawn.
Transfer targets31 Aug 2026
The approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.
Transfer targets31 Aug 2026
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: La Equidad keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
Squad31 Aug 2026
Siebe Horemans gets the move he always wanted
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Siebe Horemans has just signed for PSV, and for once the answer mattered.
Squad31 Aug 2026
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at PSV this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Market31 Aug 2026
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Utrecht have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Match29 Aug 2026
3‑0, and Yoann Cathline took the headlines on an afternoon when everything Utrecht tried came off. Days like this are retold all winter.
Player ratings31 Aug 2026
A brace, and Yoann Cathline takes the afternoon — 8.36
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Yoann Cathline provided it, and the 8.36 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Market31 Aug 2026
PSV pay $9.5M, and the deal is done. The number reads well on a balance sheet; whether it reads well on the pitch is next season's question.
Market31 Aug 2026
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Utrecht can pretend not to have heard.
Squad31 Aug 2026
Words exchanged at Utrecht
Gjivai Zechiël 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.
Market31 Aug 2026
Cambuur pay $320.0K, and the deal is done. The number reads well on a balance sheet; whether it reads well on the pitch is next season's question.
Transfer targets31 Aug 2026
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Vitesse have kept their man, and Utrecht go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
The dugout31 Aug 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Yoann Cathline, and the manager let it.
In brief
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Squad
A row about effort at Utrecht
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Player ratings
One of those days for Dani de Wit
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Squad
Utrecht are still strangers to each other
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Match22 Aug 2026
3‑0, and Jerdy Schouten took the headlines on an afternoon when everything PSV tried came off. Days like this are retold all winter.
Market24 Aug 2026
Ricardo Pepi has left for Chelsea in a $29.7M deal. The accountants are pleased; the supporters are less certain.
Transfer targets24 Aug 2026
An offer of $11.1M for Dani de Wit
PSV have gone to Utrecht with a bid, and the supporters have gone to the internet with an opinion about it. Whether either changes anything is up to the selling club.
Transfer targets24 Aug 2026
$9.5M on the table at Utrecht. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
Market24 Aug 2026
“I listened, I thought about it, and I am staying. That is the whole story.” The clubs had agreed a fee. Sami Bouhoudane had not agreed to go, which turned out to be the part that mattered.
Transfer targets24 Aug 2026
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. AZ have kept their man, and PSV go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Transfer targets24 Aug 2026
$4.3M was the most the club would pay and Utrecht were asking for more. Deals like this are revived in the last week of a window roughly half the time, and everybody involved knows it.
Player ratings24 Aug 2026
At 37 every good afternoon gets called a throwback, and this one was: 8.13, and nobody on the pitch better.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market24 Aug 2026
“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 Utrecht, and it is not being withdrawn.
Market24 Aug 2026
NAC Breda come back empty-handed
The bid was some way short and Utrecht did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Market24 Aug 2026
“I know what people will say. I know what I want, and it is here.” Kristiansund had the fee agreed and the shirt ready; they did not have the player, and now they will not.
Market24 Aug 2026
The phone has started ringing about Siebe Horemans again, and this time the name on the line is PSV. Utrecht are listening politely and promising nothing.
Squad24 Aug 2026
Gjivai Zechiël 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.
Transfer targets24 Aug 2026
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Go Ahead Eagles have kept their man, and Utrecht go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
The dugout24 Aug 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Vasilis Barkas, and the manager let it.
The dugout24 Aug 2026
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.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Transfer targets3 Aug 2026
The offer went to SuperSport United 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.
Market3 Aug 2026
Fulham come back empty-handed
The bid was some way short and Utrecht did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Squad3 Aug 2026
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Kevin Paredes and Utrecht agree another 5 years.
Squad3 Aug 2026
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Utrecht this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Market3 Aug 2026
The name of Ángel Alarcón has come up in conversations Utrecht were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Victor Jensen 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.