Marked for Alex Oweilayefa
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match30 Jan 2027
The run now stands at 7, and the questions being asked around Bendel Insurance are no longer polite ones.
Player ratings1 Feb 2027
Successful dribbles: 28. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad1 Feb 2027
Victor Torisheju: 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.” Bendel Insurance have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Market1 Feb 2027
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Bendel Insurance can pretend not to have heard.
Squad1 Feb 2027
Muritala Lawal 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.
Squad1 Feb 2027
Words at Bendel Insurance training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Julius Emiloju Junior 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.
Match30 Jan 2027
Oke Kayode scored, and precious little else went right: 1‑2 to Kano Pillars, and a quiet walk to the dressing room.
Market1 Feb 2027
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Julius Emiloju Junior has his answer from Bendel Insurance; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
Squad1 Feb 2027
“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.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad18 Jan 2027
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Bendel Insurance may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Player ratings18 Jan 2027
Successful dribbles: 29. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Match16 Jan 2027
The run now stands at 5, and the questions being asked around Bendel Insurance are no longer polite ones.
Match16 Jan 2027
The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 5 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
Market18 Jan 2027
The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.
Squad18 Jan 2027
Muritala Lawal 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.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market4 Jan 2027
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Bendel Insurance can pretend not to have heard.
Player ratings4 Jan 2027
Successful dribbles: 24. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad4 Jan 2027
Muritala Lawal 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.
Boardroom4 Jan 2027
6 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.
Match2 Jan 2027
3 games without scoring. Strikers stop looking up, midfielders take the extra touch, and every shot that clears the bar is followed by a groan that has been building since the last goal.
Market4 Jan 2027
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Adebayo Obi is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Market4 Jan 2027
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Etebo Okoye is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Market4 Jan 2027
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Oche Nwankwo has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
Squad4 Jan 2027
Elmer Arunta 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.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad9 Nov 2026
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Bendel Insurance may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Squad9 Nov 2026
Muritala Lawal 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.
Squad9 Nov 2026
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Alex Oweilayefa and Bendel Insurance agree another 3 years.