Marked for Steve Biko Omollo
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market1 Feb 2027
“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 The request is on a desk at Kariobangi Sharks, and it is not being withdrawn.
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
Sebastian Wekesa 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
Words at Kariobangi Sharks training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Samba Diallo 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.
Squad1 Feb 2027
11 new faces, and Kariobangi Sharks are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
Squad1 Feb 2027
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.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market4 Jan 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.
Squad4 Jan 2027
Faiz Opande in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Kariobangi Sharks this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad4 Jan 2027
A move Omer Zaguri would have made for nothing
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Omer Zaguri is living that version at Kariobangi Sharks, and it tends to show in the first month.
Squad4 Jan 2027
Words at Kariobangi Sharks training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Samba Diallo 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.
Squad4 Jan 2027
6 signings in three months. Every one of them may be an upgrade and the team can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild that never appears in the transfer-window verdicts.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad23 Nov 2026
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Kariobangi Sharks may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Squad23 Nov 2026
Faiz Opande in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Kariobangi Sharks this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad23 Nov 2026
Words at Kariobangi Sharks training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Samba Diallo 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
Match26 Sep 2026
The unbeaten run reaches 11. Some of them were wins and some were escapes, but a side that refuses to lose is a side other dressing rooms talk about.
Player ratings28 Sep 2026
No sign of nerves from Ally Salum Omar at 21 — 7.80
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Ally Salum Omar did not need any: 7.80, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Squad28 Sep 2026
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Kariobangi Sharks may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Player ratings28 Sep 2026
Successful dribbles: 22. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad28 Sep 2026
Faiz Opande in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Kariobangi Sharks this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The terraces28 Sep 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.
Squad28 Sep 2026
Samba Diallo gets it from the manager
“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.
Squad28 Sep 2026
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.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match5 Sep 2026
8 games unbeaten now. Some were earned and some were survived, but a habit is forming — and habits are the hardest thing in football to play against.
Squad7 Sep 2026
Faiz Opande 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.
Squad7 Sep 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.
Player ratings7 Sep 2026
A mark of 7.97, and nobody in the ground would argue with it. He was involved in everything that mattered and most of what did not.
Squad7 Sep 2026
Ally Salum Omar named in the team of the month
A month is long enough that nobody gets in by accident. Ally Salum Omar is in the division's best eleven for it, which is a quieter compliment than an award and a more reliable one.
Match5 Sep 2026
It needed Bourama Boiré to find the net to bring anything home at all: 1‑1 against Sofapaka, and half the dressing room will call it a point won.
Squad7 Sep 2026
Samba Diallo has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at Kariobangi Sharks 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.
Player ratings7 Sep 2026
Successful dribbles: 11. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Market7 Sep 2026
Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Sebastian Wekesa’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad17 Aug 2026
There were 6 saves in it, and at least three that had no business being saves at all. The ten outfield players owe him a drink and they know it.
Market17 Aug 2026
The offer from Ulinzi Stars for Clinton Machaka 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.
Squad17 Aug 2026
Joseph Mwangi 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.
Match15 Aug 2026
It finished 1‑0, and it was Samba Diallo’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Kariobangi Sharks.
Squad17 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.
Player ratings17 Aug 2026
17 times he got in the way of something. Centre-halves get written about when they make mistakes and ignored when they do not, so an afternoon like this needs saying out loud: he is the reason the scoreline reads as it does.
Player ratings17 Aug 2026
16 defensive actions and a clean sheet at the end of them. A defender's afternoon can only be told by what did not happen, which is why nobody makes a highlights package out of one and every manager in the division would take it.
Squad17 Aug 2026
6 signings in three months. Every one of them may be an upgrade and the team can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild that never appears in the transfer-window verdicts.
Player ratings17 Aug 2026
Successful dribbles: 12. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.