Marked for Steeve Delarue
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Market1 May 2028
“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 The request is on a desk at Toulouse FC, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad1 May 2028
A fracture rules Steeve Delarue out for 15 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Toulouse FC will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Market1 May 2028
Rafik Messali has one foot out of the door
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Toulouse FC they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Market1 May 2028
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
Match29 Apr 2028
4 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.
Squad1 May 2028
Rasmus Nicolaisen 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.
Loan watch1 May 2028
The goals keep arriving from Santiago Hidalgo’s exile
17 goals in 33 games at Grenoble Foot 38 — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Toulouse FC updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
Squad1 May 2028
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Djibril Sidibé was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout1 May 2028
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Kjetil Haug, and the manager let it.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad24 Apr 2028
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 23 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Squad24 Apr 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Toulouse FC this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad24 Apr 2028
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Djibril Sidibé was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout24 Apr 2028
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Jacen Russell-Rowe, and the manager let it.
Squad24 Apr 2028
Toulouse FC are still strangers to each other
5 new signings in one window. Every one may be an upgrade and the side can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild the verdicts never mention.
The dugout24 Apr 2028
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.
Match22 Apr 2028
It finished 1‑1, and it somehow always looked like it would. One of those afternoons where the table moves less than the tempers.
The dugout24 Apr 2028
The manager’s verdict
“I am frustrated, honestly. We did enough to win and we did not win.” Interim Coach was not hiding it after 1‑1, and nobody in the Toulouse FC dressing room was either.
Market24 Apr 2028
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Toulouse FC know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad17 Apr 2028
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 33 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Loan watch17 Apr 2028
Álex Domínguez’s loan is measured in nothing happening
15 clean sheets from 34 appearances at Grenoble Foot 38. That is the whole of a goalkeeper’s job done properly, and it is being done a long way from the club that owns him.
Squad17 Apr 2028
Words at Toulouse FC training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rafik Messali 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.
Squad17 Apr 2028
Noham Kamara 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 Toulouse FC this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad17 Apr 2028
“Some mornings you wake up and you are still a long way from everything you know.” It is not the football and it never was; Toulouse FC are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
The dugout17 Apr 2028
The manager makes an example of Jesé
“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.
Match15 Apr 2028
1‑1, and both dressing rooms will call it two points lost. A draw that asked plenty of questions and answered none of them.
The dugout17 Apr 2028
Kjetil Haug knocks on the manager's door
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Toulouse FC, and both men came out saying it was fine.
The dugout17 Apr 2028
The manager’s verdict
“I am frustrated, honestly. We did enough to win and we did not win.” Interim Coach was not hiding it after 1‑1, and nobody in the Toulouse FC dressing room was either.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
The terraces10 Apr 2028
The mood at Toulouse FC has turned into something else
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
Squad10 Apr 2028
41 days out for Steeve Delarue after a fracture
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Toulouse FC will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Market10 Apr 2028
“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 Toulouse FC, and it is not being withdrawn.
Market10 Apr 2028
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Toulouse FC they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad10 Apr 2028
Kjetil Haug 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.
Boardroom10 Apr 2028
Still no name above the door at Toulouse FC
Day 9 of the vacancy. Candidates have been priced, sounded out and quietly ruled out — and the caretaker’s win ratio is becoming an argument all by itself.
The dugout10 Apr 2028
“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.
Squad10 Apr 2028
Words at Toulouse FC training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Anatole Abang 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.
Player ratings10 Apr 2028
Nobody on the pitch touched Yann Gboho
7.40, and no serious argument from anybody who was there. Toulouse FC had eleven men on the pitch and one of them decided how it went.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Boardroom3 Apr 2028
The end came on a Tuesday, as these things usually do: a short meeting, a shorter statement, and Olivier Benoit clearing his office by noon. Football’s cruellest ritual, performed to schedule.
Boardroom3 Apr 2028
Toulouse FC have nobody left to take training
Not an interim appointment — an institution with an empty coaching office. Somebody unfamiliar will run the sessions this week, and the question of how a club gets into this state is one the board will be asked and will not answer.
Squad3 Apr 2028
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 50 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Boardroom3 Apr 2028
The Toulouse FC board call everybody in
Nothing has been announced and everybody understands what it means. A board that summons the whole football department on a Tuesday morning is a board that has stopped believing the problem will fix itself.
Player ratings3 Apr 2028
Two goals and a mark of 8.77 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Market3 Apr 2028
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Toulouse FC is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Boardroom3 Apr 2028
“Somebody has to pick the team on Saturday, and this week that is me.” An interim appointment with no promises attached, which is how most of them start.
Squad3 Apr 2028
Shea Charles and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Loan watch3 Apr 2028
31 appearances at Grenoble Foot 38 and the goals keep coming. Toulouse FC are watching this more closely than the borrowing club would like.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad27 Mar 2028
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 59 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Squad27 Mar 2028
Shea Charles 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.
Squad27 Mar 2028
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Rafik Messali was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Market27 Mar 2028
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Toulouse FC know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
The dugout27 Mar 2028
Rafik Messali knocks on the manager’s door
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Rafik Messali trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
The dugout27 Mar 2028
Jesé has been promised minutes
A conversation in the manager’s office, and a commitment that came out of it. Promises like that are cheap to make and expensive to break, and Jesé has written the date down.
Loan watch27 Mar 2028
30 appearances away from home and 3 goals to show for them. Every one of them makes next summer's conversation a little more expensive.
Loan watch27 Mar 2028
8 appearances at FC Versailles and the goals keep coming. Toulouse FC are watching this more closely than the borrowing club would like.
Loan watch27 Mar 2028
25 appearances at Paris 13 Atletico and the goals keep coming. Toulouse FC are watching this more closely than the borrowing club would like.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad20 Mar 2028
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 67 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
The dugout20 Mar 2028
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Toulouse FC may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Match18 Mar 2028
No end in sight to Toulouse FC's wait for a win
5 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Toulouse FC has to find a result from somewhere.
Squad20 Mar 2028
Shea Charles 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.
Loan watch20 Mar 2028
Álex Domínguez’s loan is measured in nothing happening
13 clean sheets from 31 appearances at Grenoble Foot 38. That is the whole of a goalkeeper’s job done properly, and it is being done a long way from the club that owns him.
The dugout20 Mar 2028
The manager makes an example of Max Lowe
“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.
Market20 Mar 2028
“We are a long way apart, and pretending otherwise helps nobody.” Neither side is close, and the calendar is not on the club's side.
Squad20 Mar 2028
Anatole Abang 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.
In brief
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The dugout
The manager has not finished forgetting Kjetil Haug's mistake
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Squad
Too much change too quickly at Toulouse FC
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The dugout
The view from the dugout
From our football correspondent
Crisis
The terraces13 Mar 2028
Anger at Toulouse FC spills outside the ground
It has stopped being a mood in the stands and started being something organised. Boards can ignore a bad atmosphere for a long time; they cannot ignore this stage of it for very long at all.
Squad13 Mar 2028
76 days out for Steeve Delarue after a fracture
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Toulouse FC will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Market13 Mar 2028
“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 Toulouse FC, and it is not being withdrawn.
Market13 Mar 2028
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Toulouse FC they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Match11 Mar 2028
No end in sight to Toulouse FC's wait for a win
4 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Toulouse FC has to find a result from somewhere.
Squad13 Mar 2028
Rasmus Nicolaisen 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.
Player ratings13 Mar 2028
Successful dribbles: 21. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
Squad13 Mar 2028
Djibril Sidibé 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.
Squad13 Mar 2028
“Some mornings you wake up and you are still a long way from everything you know.” It is not the football and it never was; Toulouse FC are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Boardroom6 Mar 2028
The silence upstairs is getting loud at Toulouse FC
Nobody on the board has said anything against the manager, which is the point — they have stopped saying anything for him either.
Boardroom6 Mar 2028
Olivier Benoit has until the next board meeting
What was said behind closed doors has now been said in front of a microphone. Everybody at Toulouse FC can do the arithmetic, including the man it is aimed at.
Squad6 Mar 2028
85 days out for Steeve Delarue after a fracture
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Toulouse FC will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Market6 Mar 2028
Rafik Messali has one foot out of the door
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Toulouse FC they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
The dugout6 Mar 2028
Alexis Sauvage: that is not what I was promised
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Toulouse FC have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Market6 Mar 2028
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Toulouse FC heard it as anything else.
Squad6 Mar 2028
Charlie Cresswell and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Loan watch6 Mar 2028
28 appearances at Grenoble Foot 38 and the goals keep coming. Toulouse FC are watching this more closely than the borrowing club would like.
Squad6 Mar 2028
Noé Akpakoun is a better footballer than he was
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 19 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.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad28 Feb 2028
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 93 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Squad28 Feb 2028
A one-man rearguard from Kjetil Haug
There were 7 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.
Market28 Feb 2028
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Shea Charles wants continental football; whether Toulouse FC can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
Loan watch28 Feb 2028
27 appearances at Grenoble Foot 38 and the goals keep coming. Toulouse FC are watching this more closely than the borrowing club would like.
Match26 Feb 2028
Olympique Lyonnais left with the points after a 0‑1 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Squad28 Feb 2028
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Toulouse FC can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
Squad28 Feb 2028
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Anatole Abang was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Loan watch28 Feb 2028
Enzo Faty wants to come home
“I did not go to Plymouth Argyle to sit and watch. I want to come back to Toulouse FC and fight for my place.” 1 appearances in 5 matches say the rest.
The dugout28 Feb 2028
The view from the dugout
“We will look at it, we will learn from it, and we go again.” The three sentences every manager keeps for a 0‑1 defeat, delivered by Olivier Benoit to a room that had heard them before.
In brief
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The dugout
No place for Max Lowe on the big day
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The dugout
No hiding place for Jesé
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The dugout
Kjetil Haug knocks on the manager's door
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad21 Dec 2026
Steeve Delarue damages knee ligaments — 15 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 15 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.
Match19 Dec 2026
1‑4 to Olympique de Marseille, and it was every bit as bad as the number suggests. There are defeats you argue about and defeats you apologise for; this was the second kind.
Squad21 Dec 2026
At 22 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.
Match19 Dec 2026
4 matches, two or more conceded in every one of them. Sides that create as much as this can live with it for a while. Nobody lives with it forever.
Squad21 Dec 2026
Kjetil Haug and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
The dugout21 Dec 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Jacen Russell-Rowe, and the manager let it.
Boardroom21 Dec 2026
Nobody left the Toulouse FC dressing room in a hurry
The door stayed shut a long time after the final whistle. What was said in there is between them; whether it worked is between them and Saturday.
The dugout21 Dec 2026
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 1‑4, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
Player ratings21 Dec 2026
The one goal a footballer does not get to celebrate and does not get to forget either. His name is in the wrong column and nothing about it was meant.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad14 Dec 2026
Steeve Delarue damages knee ligaments — 24 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 24 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.
Match12 Dec 2026
1‑5 to Paris Saint-Germain, and it was every bit as bad as the number suggests. There are defeats you argue about and defeats you apologise for; this was the second kind.
Squad14 Dec 2026
A one-man rearguard from Kjetil Haug
There were 8 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.
Squad14 Dec 2026
Aron Dønnum and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Loan watch14 Dec 2026
“I watch every Toulouse FC game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at US Boulogne runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
Market14 Dec 2026
It is not a grievance and it is not a demand: he wants to play continental football, and he has stopped hiding it. Whether Toulouse FC can give him that is a question about the club, not about him.
Squad14 Dec 2026
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Mário Sauer commits to Toulouse FC for another 5 years.
Match12 Dec 2026
After 4 games, Toulouse FC finally taste it again
The first defeat in 4 matches. The manager will say it had to come; the dressing room will say it did not have to come against Paris Saint-Germain; the supporters will say both, in that order, all week.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Squad7 Dec 2026
A knee injury of the worst kind for Steeve Delarue
31 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Toulouse FC lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Match5 Dec 2026
Dodi Lukébakio wins it after the whistle should have gone
92 minutes played. Dodi Lukébakio found the finish in time that only existed because of earlier delays, and RC Strasbourg went from a point to nothing inside one movement.
Player ratings7 Dec 2026
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 8.72, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
The dugout7 Dec 2026
Noah Lahmadi: that is not what I was promised
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Toulouse FC have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Match5 Dec 2026
Momentum is a hard thing to buy and an easy thing to lose, and right now Toulouse FC have 4 straight wins of it.
Player ratings7 Dec 2026
Yann Gboho runs at them all day
Successful dribbles: 23. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad7 Dec 2026
Dodi Lukébakio and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Loan watch7 Dec 2026
“I did not go to Gimnàstic to sit and watch. I want to come back to Toulouse FC and fight for my place.” 0 appearances in 16 matches say the rest.