15 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Olympic Charleroi lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
The offer from RAAL La Louviere for Adrien Saussez 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.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Olympic Charleroi will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Olympic Charleroi can pretend not to have heard.
Olympic Charleroi moved before anybody else could: a new deal for Dries Doku, agreed quietly and announced loudly. Boards extend managers for many reasons; the good one is the one this looks like.
The morning the pathway stops being a brochure and becomes a team sheet. Most of them will not be here in three years; all of them have already done the hard part, which was getting to today.
Add another name to the list: Francs Borains have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Niklo Dailly. The answer from Olympic Charleroi has not changed — yet.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Joaquin Seys 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.
25 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Olympic Charleroi lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Olympic Charleroi will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
“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 The request is on a desk at Olympic Charleroi, and it is not being withdrawn.
Adrien Saussez 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Joaquin Seys 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 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.
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.
33 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Olympic Charleroi lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Olympic Charleroi will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
“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 Olympic Charleroi, and it is not being withdrawn.
Adrien Saussez 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 thought about how hard another man trains, and Jonás Ramalho was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
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 Oliver Šarkić is on it.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Luca Ferrara signs something — a contract at Olympic Charleroi or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 18 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
The system has changed and his position has not. A footballer can improve his form; he cannot improve the manager’s formation, and that is the whole of the problem.
Dino Arslanagić is 33 and has run out of things to prove. What he has left is where to stand, when to slow it down and what to say at half-time, and none of that is on a fitness chart.
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 Kevin Kis is on it.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Kevin Kis’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Olympic Charleroi needing him to play as if none of it matters.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Olympic Charleroi, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Successful dribbles: 23. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
Myung-jun Kim 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.
Olympic Charleroi asked and Kawasaki Frontale said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Olympic Charleroi, another week without a signature from Indy Boonen.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Jonás Ramalho was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout14 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 0‑1 Dries Doku left the room before anybody could ask which.