“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 The request is on a desk at Katsina United, and it is not being withdrawn.
Samson Obi and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Player ratings19 Jul 2027
Uche Collins was on a different afternoon to everybody else
9.87. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
Squad19 Jul 2027
Words at Katsina United training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Victor Peter 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 ratings19 Jul 2027
Samson Obi was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.21. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Katsina United may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Squad15 Mar 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.
Level with 90 minutes on the clock, after an afternoon Katsina United had all but put away. Enyimba will call it a point earned; the home dressing room will call it two given away, and both of them are right.
Somebody else has been better, the manager has said so with a team sheet, and there is no argument to be had. He will get the shirt back the only way it can be got back.
The club is not barred from spending; it simply has nothing to spend that it has not first raised. Every name linked with Katsina United this window arrives with a name leaving in the same sentence.
Samson Obi 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.
7 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Katsina United and Kano Pillars in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Victor Peter was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“The easiest signature of my career.” Usman Barau and Katsina United agree another 3 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
The dugout15 Feb 2027
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 3‑4 defeat, delivered by Ibrahim Okoye to a room that had heard them before.
The club is not barred from spending; it simply has nothing to spend that it has not first raised. Every name linked with Katsina United this window arrives with a name leaving in the same sentence.
In brief
Player ratingsSani Faisal beats them one at a time
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Aduana Stars waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Katsina United is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Katsina United have done the hard part with Barau, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
Samson Obi 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.
Squad11 Jan 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.
Bendel Insurance left with the points after a 0‑1 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
The dugout11 Jan 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 0‑1 Ibrahim Okoye left the room before anybody could ask which.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Katsina United have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Sani Faisal was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation Katsina United are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Sani Faisal trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Katsina United this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Katsina United, another week without a signature from Victor Peter.
Squad7 Dec 2026
Musa Sulaiman 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.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Katsina United, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Victor Peter was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Mohammed Manga and Katsina United agree another 1 years.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Joshua Enaholo trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Katsina United this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad9 Nov 2026
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.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Katsina United, and both men came out saying it was fine.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
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 Divine Chidera has written the date down.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Katsina United have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Samson Obi commits to Katsina United for another 2 years.
Squad12 Oct 2026
Words at Katsina United training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Victor Peter 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Katsina United this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
7 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.
A brace, and Uche Collins takes the afternoon — 8.88
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Uche Collins provided it, and the 8.88 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Mohammed Manga 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.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Sani Faisal 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 board was up, the win was priced in, and then Wikki Tourists scored. There is no worse minute to concede in and the ground emptied in the silence that follows one.
The system has changed and his position has not. A footballer can improve his form; he cannot improve the manager’s formation, and that is the whole of the problem.
7 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.
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.
In brief
The dugoutThe manager’s verdict
The dugoutThe manager makes an example of Usman Sadiq