Marked for Laurestone Massala
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market19 Oct 2026
The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.
Squad19 Oct 2026
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 19 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.
Match17 Oct 2026
The goals have deserted RWDM
3 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at RWDM can tell you which week it ends in.
Squad19 Oct 2026
Mathis Hannedouche 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.
Squad19 Oct 2026
Words exchanged at RWDM
Gaëtan Robail 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.
Squad19 Oct 2026
RWDM are still strangers to each other
9 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.
Loan watch19 Oct 2026
“I did not go to Zalgiris to sit and watch. I want to come back to RWDM and fight for my place.” 0 appearances in 9 matches say the rest.
The dugout19 Oct 2026
Hans Doku: “We have to be better”
“It is not the end of the world and it is not good enough. Both of those are true.” The manager, after a 0‑0 draw, said the honest thing and then went to say it again inside.
The dugout19 Oct 2026
“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.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Match26 Aug 2026
RWDM march on in the cup
Sint-Truiden are out and RWDM go through, 3‑0 the final word. The bracket opens up a little, and everyone allows themselves a look at it.
Squad31 Aug 2026
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the whole of the defence. 8 saves, several of them the kind nobody expects to see made, and ten outfield players who owe him a drink.
Player ratings31 Aug 2026
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 8.16, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
Market31 Aug 2026
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
Transfer targets31 Aug 2026
Everything agreed with Kawasaki Frontale, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
Transfer targets31 Aug 2026
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Vissel Kobe have kept their man, and RWDM go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
The terraces31 Aug 2026
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.
Match29 Aug 2026
RWDM come up short against Lierse
Lierse left with the points after a 0‑1 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Player ratings31 Aug 2026
Marked 8.05 — 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.
In brief
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Match
The run is over for RWDM
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Squad
Words exchanged at RWDM
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The dugout
Hans Doku: “No excuses”
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Market24 Aug 2026
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
Market24 Aug 2026
The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.
Match22 Aug 2026
RWDM make it 3 in a row
Momentum is a hard thing to buy and an easy thing to lose, and right now RWDM have 3 straight wins of it.
Transfer targets24 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.
Match22 Aug 2026
RWDM get the job done against Club NXT
A 1‑0 win over Club NXT, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Squad24 Aug 2026
Tempers go at RWDM
Laurestone Massala 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.
Player ratings24 Aug 2026
Nobody on the pitch touched Tibo Persyn
7.61, and no serious argument from anybody who was there. RWDM had eleven men on the pitch and one of them decided how it went.
Transfer targets24 Aug 2026
Gamba Osaka have been asked whether they would lend him. Loans are agreed quickly or not at all, and this one will be one or the other by the weekend.
Squad24 Aug 2026
RWDM are still strangers to each other
5 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.
In brief
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The dugout
Hans Doku has his say
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Squad
Words at RWDM training over how hard people work
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Squad
The formation has left Trey Kongolo behind
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Player ratings17 Aug 2026
Two goals and a mark of 8.03 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Market17 Aug 2026
The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.
Transfer targets17 Aug 2026
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at Gamba Osaka is saying, and nobody at RWDM is enjoying the guessing.
Transfer targets17 Aug 2026
RWDM asked and DAC Dunajska Streda said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Match15 Aug 2026
It finished 2‑0, and it was Olivier Dumont’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to RWDM.
Player ratings17 Aug 2026
Successful dribbles: 19. 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.
Player ratings17 Aug 2026
Marked 8.22 — 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.
Squad17 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 RWDM this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Transfer targets17 Aug 2026
A loan move for Abdoul Ouattara is in the works
RWDM have made the call to Ipswich Town. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
In brief
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Transfer targets
A loan move for Trey Kongolo is in the works
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The dugout
The manager’s verdict
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Squad
Words at RWDM training over how hard people work