It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at US Moursal this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad5 Apr 2027
Idriss Haroun 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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what US Moursal can pretend not to have heard.
Yannick Masra 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.
Squad29 Mar 2027
Words at US Moursal training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Idriss Haroun 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.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at US Moursal, and 0 appearances in 33 say he has earned the hearing.
“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 The request is on a desk at US Moursal, and it is not being withdrawn.
The hardest thing about being 17 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Djibrine Oumar did not need any: 7.92, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
At 34 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.01 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Defending was optional and nobody took up the option. 15 goals between US Moursal and AS Algoy, and not one of the people who paid to be there will ask for the money back.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at US Moursal this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Gazelle this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad1 Feb 2027
Words at Gazelle training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Osée Natoyoum 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.
Still no offer on the table, and Sirojiddin Solijonov’s deal keeps shrinking. In boardroom language, silence this long stops being an oversight and starts being an answer.
“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 US Moursal, and it is not being withdrawn.
Player ratings1 Feb 2027
Djibrine Oumar, 17, plays like he has been here for years — 8.21
A mark of 8.21 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 17-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
The chase for Yannick Masra ended with $180.0K changing hands and Aiglons out of reasons to say no. The supporters will judge the fee the only way that matters: on Saturdays.
Yannick Masra 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.
At 17 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.
“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.
Squad1 Feb 2027
Words at US Moursal training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Idriss Haroun 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.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Muhammadqodir Rasuljonov and US Moursal agree another 3 years.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what US Moursal can pretend not to have heard.
The offer from Foullah Edifice for Youssouf Allamine 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.
The phone has started ringing about Moussa Doungous again, and this time the name on the line is Renaissance. US Moursal are listening politely and promising nothing.
Mahamat Abakar 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.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Mahamat Abakar. 3‑2 against Gazelle, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
“I watch every US Moursal game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Gazelle runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
The words a physio says slowly. 40 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
91 minutes played. Gbolahan Salami found the finish in time that only existed because of earlier delays, and Aiglons went from a point to nothing inside one movement.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Gbolahan Salami provided it, and the 9.08 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.” Gazelle have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Gbolahan Salami. 3‑2 against Aiglons, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Squad7 Dec 2026
Words at Gazelle training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Mondli Miya 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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 30 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what US Moursal can pretend not to have heard.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” US Moursal have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Mahamat Abakar 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.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at US Moursal, and 0 appearances in 17 say he has earned the hearing.
3 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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 58 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at US Moursal this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Successful dribbles: 21. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad9 Nov 2026
Words at US Moursal training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Idriss Haroun 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.
“I watch every US Moursal game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Gazelle runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
The words a physio says slowly. 96 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Osée Natoyoum 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.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Riva Adha has just signed for Gazelle, and for once the answer mattered.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Gazelle know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 23 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at US Moursal this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad12 Oct 2026
Idriss Haroun has improved at 34, 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. 3 points of it, over months, at an age where the direction normally only goes one way.
“I watch every US Moursal game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Gazelle runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
Squad12 Oct 2026
Words at US Moursal training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Narcisse Djimet 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.
Everything was agreed until it was not, and Idriss Doungous reports back to US Moursal with a summer to forget. Neither club is saying who walked away from the table.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Saleh Moustapha is 23, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
At 28 the improving is meant to be over. It is not: 3 points better than the mark taken at the start of the year, which is the sort of thing that happens to players who take the boring parts of the job seriously.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at US Moursal, and 0 appearances in 5 say he has earned the hearing.
In brief
SquadMarius Abakar falls out with a teammate over standards
MarketThe window shut and Saleh Tokindang is still in the building
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Gazelle this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
There is a level at which a footballer stops being tested and starts being contained, and he reached it some time ago. Gazelle know it, and so does everybody who watches him.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Gazelle, another week without a signature from Abbas Maigué.
10 signings in three months. Every one of them may be an upgrade and the team can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild that never appears in the transfer-window verdicts.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Youness Mokhtar signs something — a contract at Gazelle or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.