The Lokeren Chronicle
Match7 Jun 2027
Lokeren sink to position 16
7 points, and a fixture list that is running out. The mathematics are not yet cruel, but they are no longer kind.
Boardroom7 Jun 2027
Leander Batshuayi has until the next board meeting
What was said behind closed doors has now been said in front of a microphone. Everybody at Lokeren can do the arithmetic, including the man it is aimed at.
Boardroom7 Jun 2027
Crisis meeting at Lokeren
The official line will be that it was routine. It was not routine, the timing says so, and every person in that room knows what the next bad result costs.
The dugout7 Jun 2027
Mathis Coudour says Lokeren went back on their word
“I was told what my role would be, and I signed on that basis. It has not happened.” A grievance with a date attached is the hardest kind to settle.
Market7 Jun 2027
Mayron de Almeida puts it in writing
“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 The request is on a desk at Lokeren, and it is not being withdrawn.
Transfer targets7 Jun 2027
Lokeren make their move for Yannick Cappelle
$190.0K 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.
Squad7 Jun 2027
Tempers go at Lokeren
Tuur Dierckx 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.
Squad7 Jun 2027
Tomás Shaw gets the move he always wanted
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Tomás Shaw has just signed for Lokeren, and for once the answer mattered.
Squad7 Jun 2027
Dante Rigo 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.
In brief
- Squad Joris Gouache signs a new deal
- Market Antoine Hoppenot is free to find somewhere else
- Market Lokeren buy the years ahead of Tomás Shaw