“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Shabana have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
George Onyango 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.
Squad16 Nov 2026
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.
“I have done everything asked of me in training and it has not changed a thing on a Saturday.” The most familiar complaint in football, and one Shabana will have to answer with minutes or with a transfer.
125 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.
Squad19 Oct 2026
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.
146 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Shabana lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
There were 89 minutes on the clock and Mara Sugar had all but banked the point. Football rarely reads the room, and Shabana did not stop to explain themselves.
George Onyango 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.
Successful dribbles: 20. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad28 Sep 2026
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.
He is 22 and the ground already sings his name, which is a thing that happens to local boys and almost never to signings. Everything from here is measured against an affection he did nothing to earn except be from here.
The words a physio says slowly. 153 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.
George Onyango 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.
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 run now stands at 7, and the questions being asked around Shabana are no longer polite ones.
Boardroom7 Sep 2026
Shabana close the window on a squad of their own making
12 in and 5 out, and no more changes for months. The manager has what he has, the supporters have their opinion of it, and the table will have the last word.
Beaten 1‑3, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Squad7 Sep 2026
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.
“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.
The dugout7 Sep 2026
The manager’s verdict
“That is on me. I pick the team and I picked wrong.” Managers say that when they mean it and when they need to be seen to, and after 1‑3 Timothy Amuka left the room before anybody could ask which.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Cliff Nyakeya’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Shabana needing him to play as if none of it matters.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Shabana will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
6 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.
“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.