Marked for Fredrick Alushula
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Match13 Mar 2027
Momentum is a hard thing to buy and an easy thing to lose, and right now AFC Leopards have 6 straight wins of it.
Player ratings15 Mar 2027
No sign of nerves from Bennet Mokoena at 19 — 8.53
The hardest thing about being 19 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Bennet Mokoena did not need any: 8.53, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Squad15 Mar 2027
At 19, Bennet Mokoena is already the best thing here
An average of 7.04 in a first team he is several years too young for. AFC Leopards have something, and by now the whole division has noticed.
Market15 Mar 2027
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at AFC Leopards is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad15 Mar 2027
Kaycie 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.
Match13 Mar 2027
It finished 2‑1, and it was Bennet Mokoena’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to AFC Leopards.
Match13 Mar 2027
AFC Leopards keep winning on the road
3 away wins in a row. Travelling support is the truest kind, and this season it is being repaid in the only currency that counts.
Squad15 Mar 2027
Hassan Beja 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.
Squad15 Mar 2027
The manager makes an example of Hassan Beja
“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.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad1 Mar 2027
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 25 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Market1 Mar 2027
“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.
Match27 Feb 2027
4 wins on the spin now, and the question has changed from whether the run ends to who ends it. Confidence like this cannot be bought; it has to be earned exactly this way.
Player ratings1 Mar 2027
Successful dribbles: 25. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Market1 Mar 2027
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at AFC Leopards is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Boardroom1 Mar 2027
There is no worse way to lose a footballer. Fredrick Alushula has pre-agreed a move away, which means every appearance between now and June is made by a man the club can no longer sell, and somebody upstairs will be asked why the contract was allowed to get here.
Squad1 Mar 2027
Kaycie 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.
Match27 Feb 2027
It finished 2‑0, and it was Samuel Ssenyonjo’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to AFC Leopards.
Player ratings1 Mar 2027
One of those days for Musa Oundo
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.53, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad15 Feb 2027
Lwandiso Radebe damages knee ligaments — 25 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 25 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.
Squad15 Feb 2027
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 39 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Player ratings15 Feb 2027
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 8.18, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
Player ratings15 Feb 2027
Successful dribbles: 28. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Market15 Feb 2027
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Fredrick Alushula will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around AFC Leopards the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad15 Feb 2027
Words at AFC Leopards training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Kaycie Odhiambo 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
Steady
Squad1 Feb 2027
Lwandiso Radebe damages knee ligaments — 41 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 41 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.
Squad1 Feb 2027
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 53 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Market1 Feb 2027
The offer from Kenya Police for Fredrick Alushula 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.
Market1 Feb 2027
Only the photograph left for Victor Otieno
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Victor Otieno will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around AFC Leopards the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad1 Feb 2027
Kaycie 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.
Squad1 Feb 2027
Hassan Beja 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.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad25 Jan 2027
A knee injury of the worst kind for Ronald Sichenje
35 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. AFC Leopards lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Squad25 Jan 2027
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 60 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Market25 Jan 2027
The bid was some way short and AFC Leopards did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Squad25 Jan 2027
Kaycie Odhiambo 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.
Market25 Jan 2027
The name of Fredrick Alushula has come up in conversations AFC Leopards were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Squad25 Jan 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 AFC Leopards this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Market31 Aug 2026
“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 AFC Leopards, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad31 Aug 2026
Words at AFC Leopards training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Kaycie Odhiambo 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.
Match29 Aug 2026
0‑1 to Kenya Police, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
Squad31 Aug 2026
The manager makes an example of Victor Omune
“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.
Market31 Aug 2026
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Brian Wanyama has his answer from AFC Leopards; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
Player ratings31 Aug 2026
Defensive actions: 13, and a clean sheet at the end of it. A centre-half's best afternoons look like nothing happening, which is precisely the point.
Squad31 Aug 2026
The shape wanted a different profile against this opponent, which is a real football answer and no comfort at all to the man it is about. He did nothing wrong and he did not play.
Squad31 Aug 2026
Brian Wanyama has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at AFC Leopards will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market3 Aug 2026
The bid was some way short and AFC Leopards did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Squad3 Aug 2026
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” James Kinyanjui commits to AFC Leopards for another 4 years.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Kennedy 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.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Kaycie Odhiambo 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.
Squad3 Aug 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to James Kinyanjui, and the manager let it.
Market3 Aug 2026
Peter Maker is free to find somewhere else
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at AFC Leopards has been clear about where Peter Maker stands, which is more than many ever get.
Player ratings3 Aug 2026
A mark of 7.94, and nobody in the ground would argue with it. He was involved in everything that mattered and most of what did not.
Market3 Aug 2026
Still no offer on the table, and James Kinyanjui’s deal keeps shrinking. In boardroom language, silence this long stops being an oversight and starts being an answer.
Match1 Aug 2026
It needed Samuel Ssenyonjo to find the net to bring anything home at all: 1‑1 against Mara Sugar, and half the dressing room will call it a point won.