Kegan Johannes 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.
Squad3 Apr 2028
Bright Godwin 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.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Ismaily, another week without a signature from Benjamin Tetteh.
The demotion a club never announces and a dressing room always notices. Abdallah Mohamed is further from the side than he was, and the reason will not be given until he asks.
The team sheet says it in public every week until it changes. The only version of being dropped a footballer cannot argue with, and the one he takes hardest.
Kegan Johannes 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.
Squad13 Mar 2028
Words at Ismaily training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Bright Godwin 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.
A 2‑0 win over Masr El Makasa, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Marked 8.18 — 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 players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 2‑0, Omar El Wensh could afford to be generous.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Ismaily, another week without a signature from Mohamed Naser.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Ismaily have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Al Ahly have kept their man, and Ismaily 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 Ismaily this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The offer went to Ittihad 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.
Al Ahly will keep picking him until June and will get nothing for him after it. Hesham Mostafa has pre-agreed a move to Ismaily, and the only people who lose in that arrangement are the ones who let the contract run down.
Squad10 Jan 2028
Bright Godwin 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.
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 first defeat in 15 matches. The manager will say it had to come; the dressing room will say it did not have to come against El Masry; the supporters will say both, in that order, all week.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Ismaily can pretend not to have heard.
A defender on the scoresheet, which happens rarely enough that everybody in the ground remembers who took the corner. 1 for him, and a mark of 7.66 for the rest of it.
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
Squad13 Dec 2027
Words at Ismaily training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Bright Godwin is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Omar El Wensh after 1‑2, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
In brief
The dugoutKonta is still paying for one afternoon at Ismaily
The dugoutSomebody else is better right now than Hatem Sukar
A season average of 7.01 at an age when most of his year group are still in the youth team. Ismaily know what they have, and so, by now, does everybody else.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Anwar Abdelsalam will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Ismaily the goodbyes have quietly begun.
The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 3 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Ismaily have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Bright Godwin was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
22 days, the scan says, and scans are kinder than reality. The fixtures in that window have just become somebody else’s job.
The dugout29 Nov 2027
The view from the dugout
“We did not lose. Some weeks that is all you get, and I would rather have the point than not.” Omar El Wensh chose the glass-half-full version of 0‑0; the supporters left with the other one.
There is no complaint available here and everybody involved knows it, which does not make the walk to the bench any shorter. Form is the only currency in football that cannot be borrowed against.
A mark of 7.95 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.
Éric Traoré 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.
8 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere else.
Successful dribbles: 18. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad18 Oct 2027
Words at Ismaily training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Bright Godwin 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 earned that. I asked them for a reaction and I got one, and now I want the same again on Saturday.” Omar El Wensh on a 1‑0 afternoon that pleased him more than he was prepared to show.
“I did not go to Al Gaish to sit and watch. I want to come back to Ismaily and fight for my place.” 0 appearances in 9 matches say the rest.
Squad4 Oct 2027
Words at Ismaily training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Ahmed Ayman is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Ismaily can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
“A point is a point and I will take it, but we should have had all three.” Omar El Wensh after the 0‑0 draw, and the sentence every manager in the country said at some stage this weekend.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Ismaily have lost him in all but the paperwork.
4 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
Canaria 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 2027
Éric Traoré 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.
Ismaily asked and Internacional said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 22-year-old it feels ownership of. Abdullahi Ibrahim Bewene 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.