Marked for Emmanuel Bakare
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad15 Feb 2027
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Warri Wolves this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Match13 Feb 2027
Hard to beat is not the same as winning, but 6 matches without defeat is a foundation Warri Wolves did not have in the autumn.
The terraces15 Feb 2027
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.
Match13 Feb 2027
It finished 1‑0, and it was Chisom Orji’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Warri Wolves.
Market15 Feb 2027
Kun Khalifat are about to pick up the phone
A conversation is coming this week. Warri Wolves will put a number on him, and from there it stops being football and becomes arithmetic.
Squad15 Feb 2027
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
Player ratings15 Feb 2027
Successful dribbles: 13. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad15 Feb 2027
Chisom Orji finally opens his account
He wheeled away like a man who had been carrying it for months, because he had. Warri Wolves have their signing off the mark and one press-conference question retired.
Player ratings15 Feb 2027
A defender's afternoon for Ekene Olisema
Defensive actions: 13. He was first to everything and second to nothing, and the goalkeeper had an easy day because of it.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market24 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 Warri Wolves can pretend not to have heard.
Match22 Aug 2026
No end in sight to Warri Wolves's wait for a win
5 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Warri Wolves has to find a result from somewhere.
Squad24 Aug 2026
Alimi Adebayo 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
Successful dribbles: 21. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad24 Aug 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.
Squad24 Aug 2026
Words at Warri Wolves training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. David Joseph 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.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market10 Aug 2026
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Warri Wolves is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Boardroom10 Aug 2026
The rules permit it and it stings anyway. Abdulateef Yusuff has agreed terms with Rangers International for the summer, and until then he pulls on this shirt as a player who has already chosen his next one.
Squad10 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 Warri Wolves this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Market10 Aug 2026
Othuke Egbo told to find a new club
“They were honest with me, and I would rather know.” Othuke Egbo has been informed he is not in the manager's thinking at Warri Wolves.
Market10 Aug 2026
“We are a long way apart, and pretending otherwise helps nobody.” Neither side is close, and the calendar is not on the club's side.
Player ratings10 Aug 2026
Defensive actions: 15, and a clean sheet at the end of it. A centre-half's best afternoons look like nothing happening, which is precisely the point.
Player ratings10 Aug 2026
Successful dribbles: 14. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad10 Aug 2026
David Joseph dropped after a run of poor form
The one version of being left out a player cannot argue with, and the one he takes worst. Somebody else has been better and the team sheet says so, in public, every week until it changes.
Market10 Aug 2026
48 months to run and not a word offered. A club that lets the calendar negotiate for it usually ends up losing to the calendar.