75 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Arouca lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Ivan Lykholit has just signed for Arouca, and for once the answer mattered.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Arouca this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad19 Jun 2028
Words at Arouca training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Fally Mayulu 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.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” USM Khenchela have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason USM Khenchela will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Squad12 Jun 2028
Fouad Rahmani 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 has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Hamid Djaouchi signs something — a contract at USM Khenchela or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
99 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. USM Khenchela lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
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.
Nothing has been announced and everybody understands what it means. A board that summons the whole football department on a Tuesday morning is a board that has stopped believing the problem will fix itself.
5 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.
It has stopped being a mood in the stands and started being something organised. Boards can ignore a bad atmosphere for a long time; they cannot ignore this stage of it for very long at all.
Nobody upstairs has said anything, which is the loudest thing they could do. Results buy silence in this game; the account at USM Khenchela is running low.
The offer from Petrojet for Anis Mahdi Mendil 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 USM Khenchela this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 20 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.
In brief
SquadWords at USM Khenchela training over how hard people work
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.
Nothing has been announced and everybody understands what it means. A board that summons the whole football department on a Tuesday morning is a board that has stopped believing the problem will fix itself.
“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 USM Khenchela, 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 USM Khenchela this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
It has stopped being a mood in the stands and started being something organised. Boards can ignore a bad atmosphere for a long time; they cannot ignore this stage of it for very long at all.
Nobody upstairs has said anything, which is the loudest thing they could do. Results buy silence in this game; the account at USM Khenchela is running low.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what USM Khenchela can pretend not to have heard.
The board’s statement ran to three sentences and one of them mentioned results. Yacine Touba has managed long enough to translate: win soon, or the next statement is shorter.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason USM Khenchela 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 USM Khenchela, and it is not being withdrawn.
“The easiest signature of my career.” Oussama Litim and USM Khenchela agree another 2 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than 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 USM Khenchela this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Ziad Nemer is 20, and USM Khenchela have signed him for the player he will be rather than the one he is. The first team can wait; the point of a deal like this is the years it buys.