Marked for Léo Frechingues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Player ratings5 Oct 2026
No sign of nerves from Santiago Hidalgo at 21 — 8.05
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Santiago Hidalgo did not need any: 8.05, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Market5 Oct 2026
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Nicolas Wasbauer will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Toulouse FC the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad5 Oct 2026
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.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Léo Frechingues is 18, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Words at Toulouse FC training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Rasmus Nicolaisen 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.
Loan watch5 Oct 2026
“I did not go to Rosenborg to sit and watch. I want to come back to Toulouse FC and fight for my place.” 0 appearances in 7 matches say the rest.
The terraces5 Oct 2026
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 21-year-old it feels ownership of. Santiago Hidalgo has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
Squad5 Oct 2026
“The easiest signature of my career.” Sébastien Rodriguez and Toulouse FC agree another 1 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
The dugout5 Oct 2026
“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.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Transfer targets24 Aug 2026
$35.6M was the most the club would pay and Porto were asking for more. Deals like this are revived in the last week of a window roughly half the time, and everybody involved knows it.
Market24 Aug 2026
The bid was some way short and Toulouse FC did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Market24 Aug 2026
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Toulouse FC people have started saying his name in the past tense.
Squad24 Aug 2026
Mark McKenzie 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.
Squad24 Aug 2026
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Rasmus Nicolaisen was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Transfer targets24 Aug 2026
Toulouse FC asked and Los Angeles Football Club said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Player ratings24 Aug 2026
Successful dribbles: 16. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
The dugout24 Aug 2026
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.
Squad24 Aug 2026
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation Toulouse FC are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Transfer targets17 Aug 2026
$35.6M on the table at Porto. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
Transfer targets17 Aug 2026
An offer of $27.1M for Orkun Kökçü
Toulouse FC have gone to Besiktas with a bid, and the supporters have gone to the internet with an opinion about it. Whether either changes anything is up to the selling club.
Transfer targets17 Aug 2026
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. RC Strasbourg have kept their man, and Toulouse FC go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Transfer targets17 Aug 2026
$230.0K settles it between the clubs for Sébastien Rodriguez
Tours have accepted the money. What Toulouse FC do not yet have is the man, and between here and the photograph is a conversation about wages that both sides are dreading.
Squad17 Aug 2026
Mark McKenzie and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Boardroom17 Aug 2026
2 boys move up, and somewhere in the building the people who coached them at twelve are quietly having the best morning of their working year. Nothing about this shows up in a result and it is why the academy exists.
Squad17 Aug 2026
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Léo Frechingues commits to Toulouse FC for another 3 years.
Market17 Aug 2026
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Émile Maillard has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
Market17 Aug 2026
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Laurent Schmitt has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.