Marked for Davis Morwaswi
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Market22 Feb 2027
Only the photograph left for Derrick Otieno
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Derrick Otieno will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Shabana the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad22 Feb 2027
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Dalphine Omuri is 22, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Squad22 Feb 2027
A falling-out at Shabana
George Onyango and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
The terraces22 Feb 2027
At 20 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.
Match20 Feb 2027
Muranga Seal made Shabana work for it, but the scoreboard read 2‑0 at the end and the table does not ask how.
Squad22 Feb 2027
Cliff Nyakeya 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.
Player ratings22 Feb 2027
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.02, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
The dugout22 Feb 2027
The view from the dugout
“We controlled it. There were spells I did not like and we will look at them, but the group showed me something.” Eric Amuka, on a 2‑0 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.
The dugout22 Feb 2027
“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
Steady
Squad15 Feb 2027
A knee injury of the worst kind for Wycliffe Omondi
15 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Shabana lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Market15 Feb 2027
Only the photograph left for Dalphine Omuri
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Dalphine Omuri will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Shabana the goodbyes have quietly begun.
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 Shabana this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Match13 Feb 2027
Bidco United left with the points after a 1‑2 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Squad15 Feb 2027
A row about effort at Shabana
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Davis Morwaswi was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Match13 Feb 2027
Shabana hit back inside 4 minutes
Bidco United held the lead for 4 minutes, which is not long enough to enjoy it. Shabana answered before the celebration had properly finished, and the shape of the afternoon changed with it.
The dugout15 Feb 2027
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 1‑2, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
The dugout15 Feb 2027
“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.
Squad15 Feb 2027
Every shape has positions in it and this one does not have his. Shabana will either change the shape, change his job, or change his club, and he is waiting to hear which.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad1 Feb 2027
Dalphine Omuri damages knee ligaments — 24 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 24 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Market1 Feb 2027
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Shabana have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Boardroom1 Feb 2027
Deadline passes with 2 signed and 2 gone
That is the business done at Shabana until the window opens again. Whether it was enough will be answered on Saturdays rather than in a column, and the first Saturday is close.
Market1 Feb 2027
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Shabana is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Market1 Feb 2027
He left as a boy and has come back still knowing where the away end is. Most signings have to be explained to a town; this one needed a photograph and nothing else.
Squad1 Feb 2027
Words exchanged at Shabana
Bryton Onyona 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.
Squad1 Feb 2027
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Davis Morwaswi and Shabana agree another 4 years.
Squad1 Feb 2027
Words at Shabana training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Cliff Nyakeya 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.
Market1 Feb 2027
“There is a gap, and pretending there is not helps nobody.” Neither side has moved, and the calendar is working for exactly one of them.