The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Kakamega Homeboyz is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Edwin Mukolwe 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.
Squad30 Jul 2029
Rodgers Ouma 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.
There is a figure at which a wage bill stops being ambitious and becomes the reason nothing else is possible, and this club has reached it. Nothing is left over for a transfer, a stand or a rainy afternoon.
Wages have outrun income and the accountants have started attending meetings they used to send apologies to. Ambition comes second in a season like this.
“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 The request is on a desk at Kakamega Homeboyz, and it is not being withdrawn.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 Kakamega Homeboyz this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Derrick Otanga 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.
“Some mornings you wake up and you are still a long way from everything you know.” It is not the football and it never was; Kakamega Homeboyz are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Edwin Mukolwe 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.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Estone Esiye signs something — a contract at Kakamega Homeboyz or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
In brief
MarketThe clock does Panyo Godwin’s negotiating for him
An individual honour is a strange thing in a team game, and the best of them are never argued with. He has had the sort of year that ends with his name being read out, and Kakamega Homeboyz have had the benefit of 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 Kakamega Homeboyz this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad20 Nov 2028
Estone Esiye 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.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Kakamega Homeboyz will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Kakamega Homeboyz can pretend not to have heard.
Joshua Nyatini 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.
“The easiest signature of my career.” Estone Esiye and Kakamega Homeboyz agree another 2 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Edwin Mukolwe 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. Estone Esiye 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.
Every club in football pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time somebody has tried it.
Wages have outrun income and the accountants have started attending meetings they used to send apologies to. Ambition comes second in a season like this.
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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Kakamega Homeboyz can pretend not to have heard.
5 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
Portipher Odhiambo 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.
“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.
Squad29 May 2028
Estone Esiye 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 had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Kakamega Homeboyz, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Panyo Godwin has just signed for Kakamega Homeboyz, 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 Kakamega Homeboyz this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Player ratings1 May 2028
Joshua Nyatini was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.97. 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.
Panyo Godwin is 20, and Kakamega Homeboyz 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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 48 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Francis Kibwage will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Kakamega Homeboyz the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Edwin Mukolwe 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. Estone Esiye 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.
“I watch every Kakamega Homeboyz game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at AFC Leopards runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.