The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Victoria United have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Victoria United have gone to Canon Yaounde 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.
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.
Add another name to the list: Unisport Bafang have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Gislain Abianda. The answer from Victoria United has not changed — yet.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Laurian Nguefack and Victoria United agree another 3 years.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Victoria United will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
It is a specific kind of quiet, a ground watching a winning position dissolve. Unisport Bafang kept coming because nothing stopped them, and Victoria United will be asked about the last half hour all week.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.83 at 33, and nobody on the pitch was better.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Victoria United this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad6 Nov 2028
Alex Diboto 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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 87 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Aigle Royal de la Menoua ended it 1‑1. The season narrows to the league now, and everyone in the ground knew it before the final whistle.
Player ratings9 Oct 2028
A brace, and Gideon Iliya takes the afternoon — 8.24
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Gideon Iliya provided it, and the 8.24 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
1 kept out in the shoot-out, and a stadium that will still be describing them in twenty years. A goalkeeper only needs one of these to be remembered forever.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Victoria United this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
There is a particular helplessness in conceding 3 times before the twentieth minute. Aigle Royal de Moungo tried to reorganise, Victoria United did not allow it, and the result was written long before it was confirmed.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 95 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Alex Diboto was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“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.
The dugout2 Oct 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 0‑2 defeat, delivered by Landry Ntcham to a room that had heard them before.
The manager has re-ordered his thinking and Aminou Bouba has come out of it lower. He will be told it is temporary, and the players who have heard that before will avoid his eye.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Aigle Royal de Moungo waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Victoria United is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
Successful dribbles: 26. 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.
The deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 6 arrived, 1 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed one.
The injury that keeps coming back, keeps being rushed back from, and quietly costs more careers than the dramatic ones. 15 days is the estimate; the honest figure depends on whether anybody is patient.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Victoria United this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Senior shirt numbers handed to boys the coaches have known since they were twelve. Most will not make it and all of them have already done the hard part.
“The easiest signature of my career.” Victor Peter and Victoria United agree another 3 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Alex Diboto 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.
A shoot-out is remembered by its ending, and this one ends with Dérrick Anye Fru: 1 kept out, and a set of supporters who will describe every one of them for the next twenty years.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Jason Moulle will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Victoria United the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Jean Marie Dongou 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.
“The easiest signature of my career.” Victor Peter and Victoria United agree another 4 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
He is 23 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Victoria United this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Victoria United is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Jean Marie Dongou 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 Alex Diboto was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“I did not go to Fortuna Mfou to sit and watch. I want to come back to Victoria United and fight for my place.” 0 appearances in 29 matches say the rest.
The dugout14 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 Landry Ntcham to a room that had heard them before.
Warm-up bib, ninety minutes of watching, and a handshake at the end that fooled nobody. Big matches tell you who a manager trusts; this one told Aminou Bouba.
Every shape has positions in it and this one does not have his. Victoria United will either change the shape, change his job, or change his club, and he is waiting to hear which.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Aigle Royal de Moungo waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Victoria United is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
7.44, 1 on the scoresheet, and the specific comedy of a back-four player celebrating like somebody who does this every week. He does not, and that is exactly why the ground reacted the way it did.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Jean Marie Dongou was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Gazelle Garoua are out and Victoria United go through, 3‑2 the final word. The bracket opens up a little, and everyone allows themselves a look at it.
Player ratings3 Jan 2028
A brace, and Alex Diboto takes the afternoon — 9.21
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Alex Diboto provided it, and the 9.21 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Victoria United have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Victoria United this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jean Marie Dongou 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.
At 22 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
Two goals and a mark of 9.20 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Jean Marie Dongou 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.
A 2‑1 win over Stade Renard de Melong, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Successful dribbles: 18. 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.
Half the programme played, position 10, 15 on the board. Doubling it is the sum every supporter has done and the only one nobody at the club will do out loud.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Marc Tsala Ndi was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“We earned that. I asked them for a reaction and I got one, and now I want the same again on Saturday.” Landry Ntcham on a 2‑1 afternoon that pleased him more than he was prepared to show.
5 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.
Yvan Mvondo Olama 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 had been thinking. Jean Marie Dongou 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.
A mark of 7.38, and nobody in the ground would argue with it. He was involved in everything that mattered and most of what did not.
The dugout15 Nov 2027
The manager’s verdict
“I am frustrated, honestly. We did enough to win and we did not win.” Landry Ntcham was not hiding it after 0‑0, and nobody in the Victoria United dressing room was either.
Ninety specific minutes wanted a different sort of player, and the manager picked one. He is not out of form and he is not in the side, and both are true.
Jean Marie Dongou 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.
1‑2 to Canon Yaounde, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
Squad1 Nov 2027
Victor Peter 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.
The dugout1 Nov 2027
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 1‑2 Landry Ntcham left the room before anybody could ask which.
Successful dribbles: 15. 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.
Nobody at Victoria United is suggesting he is out of form. The manager simply wanted somebody with a different set of qualities for ninety specific minutes, and there is nothing a player can train to fix that.
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 Franck Ntsague has written the date down.
In brief
The dugoutSamuel Segun asks for a word with the manager
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Victoria United will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
At 20 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.
Dérrick Anye Fru 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.
Squad20 Sep 2027
Bryan Nokoue has improved at 25, which nobody expected
Careers are supposed to plateau and then decline, and the players who ignore that are always the ones who were listening on the training ground. 4 points of it, over months, at an age where the direction normally only goes one way.
Marked 7.58. Ask anyone leaving the ground what settled it and you will get one name, which is the only award that has ever really counted.
The dugout20 Sep 2027
The manager’s verdict
“I am frustrated, honestly. We did enough to win and we did not win.” Landry Ntcham was not hiding it after 0‑0, and nobody in the Victoria United dressing room was either.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Franck Ntsague has just signed for Victoria United, and for once the answer mattered.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Yann Junior Mengue will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Victoria United the goodbyes have quietly begun.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Victoria United this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Victoria United asked and Unisport Bafang said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Marc Tsala Ndi 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.
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation Victoria United are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.
Victoria United have made the call to Cotonsport Garoua. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
4 arrivals, an average age nobody would call a squad, and a set of parents being shown around a building their sons will spend more time in than at home. The scouting has already happened; today is only the paperwork.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Victoria United, another week without a signature from Victor Peter.
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Victoria United people have started saying his name in the past tense.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Victoria United is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Jean Marie Dongou 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.
In brief
SquadWords at Victoria United training over how hard people work
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Victoria United, and both men came out saying it was fine.
The message was aimed at the stands as much as the dressing room: Thomas Bawak Etta plays, and the argument is closed until the manager decides otherwise.
A programme of his own, away from the group, aimed at one thing the staff think is holding him back. Most improvement happens like this and none of it makes the paper.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Victoria United is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Dérrick Anye Fru 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 Jean Marie Dongou was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.