Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Kindo Suma was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Xavier Gies’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Beerschot needing him to play as if none of it matters.
The manager wanted a different profile for this opponent, which is a real football reason and no consolation. He did nothing wrong and he did not play.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Ajax this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Marc-André ter Stegen is on it.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Ajax know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Lucas Rosa trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Rivaldo Hlatshwayo provided it, and the 8.86 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
“I was told what my role would be, and I signed on that basis. It has not happened.” A grievance with a date attached is the hardest kind to settle.
Squad26 Oct 2026
Words at Beerschot training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Genki Haraguchi 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Beerschot this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Rivaldo Hlatshwayo. 2‑1 against Eupen, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Beerschot told Baumann something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
“The players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 2‑1, Radja Vanaken could afford to be generous.
Kyan Vaesen 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.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Clovis Sossou is 19, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Genki Haraguchi was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Clubs make promises constantly and the page usually only hears about them when they are broken. This one was honoured, and the dressing room noticed that faster than any supporter did.
The dugout19 Oct 2026
Jorthy Mokio is still being punished for one mistake
Nobody will confirm it and the team sheets confirm it every week. One error has bought him a spell as second choice that is already longer than the error deserved.
Nobody will confirm this and nothing else explains the last month of selections. A costly error buys a player a period of being second choice that is always longer than the error was.
He has had enough of the noise. Whether Ajax can be a quieter place for him, or whether the only cure is a move somewhere the phone-ins are gentler, is a question for the next few months.
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Simon Adingra is on it.
He looks like a man who lives here now rather than one who is working here. It took most of a season, and at Ajax the difference is visible from the back of the stand.
The least glamorous thing a foreign signing ever does and the one that decides most of them. A player who can hear the shout behind him is a different footballer from one who cannot.
They sit in position 11 and they will be waiting. Away form is where a season shows its true character, and this side has a point to make about its own.
“Judge me on him.” Managers do not say that kind of thing by accident — it moves the pressure from Viktor Tsygankov’s shoulders onto his own, and both of them know it.
Genki Haraguchi 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.
At 35, 3 points below where he was, and a body that has started charging interest. It happens to all of them and it is still the hardest paragraph on this page.
Clubs make promises constantly and the page usually only hears about them when they are broken. This one was honoured, and the dressing room noticed that faster than any supporter did.
10 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.
Everything was agreed until it was not, and Xavier Gies reports back to Beerschot with a summer to forget. Neither club is saying who walked away from the table.
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.
Nilton Varela 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.
“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.
Squad14 Sep 2026
9 new faces, and Beerschot 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.
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 0‑2, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
He used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against Jong Gent in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
He trains hard, says the right things and goes home to an empty flat. Nobody at Beerschot has done anything wrong, which is exactly what makes it so difficult to fix.
In brief
The dugoutThe plan did not have a place for Nick Shinton