Marked for Ilies Bouramala
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match13 Oct 2029
The wait goes on for Lokeren
54 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.
The dugout15 Oct 2029
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Lokeren may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Squad15 Oct 2029
A falling-out at Lokeren
Andréa Librici and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad15 Oct 2029
Words at Lokeren training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Kyan Vaesen 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.
Match13 Oct 2029
Waasland-Beveren left with the points after a 0‑1 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Player ratings15 Oct 2029
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.
Squad15 Oct 2029
“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; Lokeren are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
The dugout15 Oct 2029
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Interim Coach after 0‑1, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
Looking ahead15 Oct 2029
He used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against Westerlo in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Transfer targets23 Jul 2029
Lokeren and Club Brugge have settled on $7.2M. The rest belongs to the player and his agent, and a supporter who has watched one of these before knows not to buy the shirt yet.
Transfer targets23 Jul 2029
Everything agreed with Sint-Truiden, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
Market23 Jul 2029
Reuben Egan hands in a written request
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Lokeren can pretend not to have heard.
Squad23 Jul 2029
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Ilies Bouramala is 20, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Squad23 Jul 2029
Brandon Mechele 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.
Transfer targets23 Jul 2029
Mouscron wanted more than $190.0K and the board would not go there. Walked away, for now, which in a transfer window means until somebody blinks.
Squad23 Jul 2029
Kyan Vaesen 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.
Squad23 Jul 2029
At 34 the improving is meant to be over, and it is not: 3 points better than a year ago. It happens to the ones who take the boring parts seriously.
Transfer targets23 Jul 2029
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Sevilla have kept their man, and Lokeren go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
The terraces9 Jul 2029
Anger at Lokeren 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.
Boardroom9 Jul 2029
The silence upstairs is getting loud at Lokeren
Nobody on the board has said anything against the manager, which is the point — they have stopped saying anything for him either.
Market9 Jul 2029
Lokeren say no — this time
The offer from Waasland-Beveren for Antoine Lejoly 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.
Market9 Jul 2029
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Lokeren have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Transfer targets9 Jul 2029
Fee done, terms next for Aden Dreyer
Lokeren and Racing Genk have settled on $700.0K. The rest belongs to the player and his agent, and a supporter who has watched one of these before knows not to buy the shirt yet.
Squad9 Jul 2029
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Enzo Faty is 22, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Transfer targets9 Jul 2029
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Lokeren have done the hard part with Sevilla, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
Squad9 Jul 2029
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Tuur Dierckx commits to Lokeren for another 2 years.
Squad9 Jul 2029
A falling-out at Lokeren
Ismail Azzaoui and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Transfer targets25 Jun 2029
The deal with Club Brugge is done in every sense but the one that puts him on the pitch. Nothing goes wrong at this stage, except on the occasions when it does.
Transfer targets25 Jun 2029
$1.9M on the table at Zulte Waregem. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
Market25 Jun 2029
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Lokeren is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad25 Jun 2029
Brandon Mechele 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.
Squad25 Jun 2029
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.
Transfer targets25 Jun 2029
$190.0K was the most the club would pay and Mouscron 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.
Squad25 Jun 2029
Kyan Vaesen 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.
Boardroom25 Jun 2029
The paperwork is done long before the player is. Funso Ojo has agreed terms to come here when his current deal runs out, which means Lokeren have spent a summer's transfer budget on a phone call.
Transfer targets25 Jun 2029
The approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.