Position 2, 52 points, and the result everyone checks first is now theirs. The word is still not being said around the ground, which is how you know everyone is thinking 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 Orlando Pirates 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.
Thalente Mbatha was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Oswin Appollis 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 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
Position 2, 27 points, and the result everyone checks first is now theirs. The word is still not being said around the ground, which is how you know everyone is thinking it.
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Simphiwe Selepe wants continental football; whether Orlando Pirates can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
Oswin Appollis was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Simphiwe Selepe 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 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.
“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 Orlando Pirates this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
At 29 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.
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.” Nkosikhona Ndaba and Orlando Pirates agree another 4 years.
Player ratings3 Sep 2029
Tshepang Moremi was on a different afternoon to everybody else
9.07. 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.
Position 3, 59 points, and the result everyone checks first is now theirs. The word is still not being said around the ground, which is how you know everyone is thinking it.
Oswin Appollis 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.
Careers are supposed to plateau and then decline, and the players who ignore that are always the ones who were listening on the training ground. 3 points of it, over months, at an age where the direction normally only goes one way.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Orlando Pirates they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
He will play here until the summer and then walk out of the door for free, having already signed elsewhere. Supporters will manage the first part of that sentence; it is the second they will struggle with.
Thalente Mbatha 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 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 Orlando Pirates hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Oswin Appollis 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.
Position 3, 59 points, and the result everyone checks first is now theirs. The word is still not being said around the ground, which is how you know everyone is thinking it.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Orlando Pirates have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Lebone Seema will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Orlando Pirates the goodbyes have quietly begun.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Orlando Pirates 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.
It finished 1‑0, and it was Brayan León’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Orlando Pirates.
Player ratings26 Feb 2029
Brayan León was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.08. 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.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Orlando Pirates they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Thalente Mbatha 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.
Defending was optional and nobody took up the option. 6 goals between Orlando Pirates and Jomo Cosmos, and not one of the people who paid to be there will ask for the money back.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Oswin Appollis 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 9.26 — 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.
He is going to Mamelodi Sundowns, the club has $3.3M it did not have on Friday, and the phone-ins have already decided how they feel about that. Selling well and selling somebody they loved are not the same skill.
Mamelodi Sundowns paid $3.3M and Orlando Pirates took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
The offer from Bidvest Wits for Lebone Seema 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Orlando Pirates this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“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 Orlando Pirates hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
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 paperwork is done long before the player is. Denwin Farmer has agreed terms to come here when his current deal runs out, which means Orlando Pirates have spent a summer's transfer budget on a phone call.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Orlando Pirates will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
14 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Orlando Pirates 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 Orlando Pirates this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Orlando Pirates heard it as anything else.
11 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.
43 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Orlando Pirates lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
2 kept out in the shoot-out, and a stadium that will still be describing them in twenty years. A goalkeeper only needs one of these to be remembered forever.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Orlando Pirates will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Thalente Mbatha 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 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.
73 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Orlando Pirates 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. 83 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
“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 Orlando Pirates, and it is not being withdrawn.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 23 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Orlando Pirates have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Orlando Pirates they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
The phone has started ringing about Lebone Seema again, and this time the name on the line is Jomo Cosmos. Orlando Pirates are listening politely and promising nothing.