Marked for Mahamat Mbainaissem
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad16 Nov 2026
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at AS Etat Major this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The dugout16 Nov 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Marius Mbainaissem, and the manager let it.
Loan watch16 Nov 2026
“I did not go to Gazelle to sit and watch. I want to come back to AS Etat Major and fight for my place.” 0 appearances in 13 matches say the rest.
The dugout16 Nov 2026
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at AS Etat Major, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Market16 Nov 2026
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. AS Etat Major know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Looking ahead16 Nov 2026
Next up on the road: Aiglons, position 11. The supporters who go will talk about it all week and the ones who do not will check their phones at ten to five.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad19 Oct 2026
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the whole of the defence. 15 saves, several of them the kind nobody expects to see made, and ten outfield players who owe him a drink.
Player ratings19 Oct 2026
15 combined actions and 6.80. The job he did is the one that shows up as other people looking good, and the only reliable way to notice it is to watch what happens on the afternoons he is missing.
Squad19 Oct 2026
Marius Doungous 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.
Loan watch19 Oct 2026
“I did not go to Gazelle to sit and watch. I want to come back to AS Etat Major and fight for my place.” 0 appearances in 9 matches say the rest.
Match17 Oct 2026
It finished 1‑1, and it somehow always looked like it would. One of those afternoons where the table moves less than the tempers.
The dugout19 Oct 2026
“It is not the end of the world and it is not good enough. Both of those are true.” The manager, after a 1‑1 draw, said the honest thing and then went to say it again inside.
The dugout19 Oct 2026
There is no complaint available here and everybody involved knows it, which does not make the walk to the bench any shorter. Form is the only currency in football that cannot be borrowed against.
Market19 Oct 2026
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. AS Etat Major know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
The dugout19 Oct 2026
Nobody at AS Etat Major 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.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad19 Oct 2026
98 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Gazelle lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Squad19 Oct 2026
8 saves, and a scoreline the ten men in front of him had no right to. Goalkeepers only get noticed on the bad days; this was one of the other ones.
The dugout19 Oct 2026
“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.
Squad19 Oct 2026
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.
Squad19 Oct 2026
A muscle injury sidelines César Abaya for 18 days
Nobody makes a documentary about a hamstring and everybody in the game fears one. Gazelle will be careful with the return date, because the second one is always worse than the first.
The terraces19 Oct 2026
At 23 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.
Player ratings19 Oct 2026
Marked 7.77. 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 dugout19 Oct 2026
The manager’s verdict
“I am not going to get carried away and I will not let them either. It was a good day. There will be harder ones.” Idriss Ngaradoumbe kept it short after the 2‑1 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad5 Oct 2026
Hassane Boudina damages knee ligaments — 112 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 112 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.
Squad5 Oct 2026
“The easiest signature of my career.” Mark Ojong and Gazelle agree another 1 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Yassine Abdelali 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.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Words at Gazelle training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Youssef El Omari 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.
Match3 Oct 2026
US Moursal left with the points after a 0‑1 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Market5 Oct 2026
“There is a gap, and pretending there is not helps nobody.” Neither side has moved, and the calendar is working for exactly one of them.
The dugout5 Oct 2026
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 0‑1, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
The dugout5 Oct 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Narcisse Allamine, and the manager let it.
Boardroom5 Oct 2026
No investment in the facilities at Gazelle
Nothing about this will be in a press release. A plan went upstairs, came back rejected, and the version of the club that would have existed in three years' time just quietly stopped being possible.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market21 Sep 2026
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what AS Etat Major can pretend not to have heard.
Squad21 Sep 2026
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at AS Etat Major this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Loan watch21 Sep 2026
“I did not go to Gazelle to sit and watch. I want to come back to AS Etat Major and fight for my place.” 0 appearances in 5 matches say the rest.
Squad21 Sep 2026
“The easiest signature of my career.” Brahim Mahamat and AS Etat Major agree another 3 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
The dugout21 Sep 2026
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Djibrine Mahamat trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Market21 Sep 2026
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. AS Etat Major know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad17 Aug 2026
Words exchanged at Gazelle
Imad Rqioui 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.
Transfer targets17 Aug 2026
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.
Market17 Aug 2026
He signed expecting a bigger stage than the one he found. It has not taken long, and it has not taken the dressing room long to notice either.
Transfer targets17 Aug 2026
AS Etat Major have been asked whether they would lend him. Loans are agreed quickly or not at all, and this one will be one or the other by the weekend.
Squad17 Aug 2026
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation Gazelle are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.
Squad17 Aug 2026
A year in and the language has not come, the city has not opened up, and he eats alone more often than anybody at Gazelle would like to admit. It is showing on Saturdays.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad10 Aug 2026
“The easiest signature of my career.” Mark Ojong and Gazelle agree another 1 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Squad10 Aug 2026
Imad Rqioui in a row with a teammate
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.
Market10 Aug 2026
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Adam Doungous is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Market10 Aug 2026
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Abdoulaye Doungous has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
Market10 Aug 2026
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Mahamat Hissein has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
Market10 Aug 2026
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Hassan Haroun has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
Squad10 Aug 2026
He is doing things every Saturday that nobody around him can answer. It is flattering for a season and a problem after that, and Gazelle know which stage they are at.
Squad10 Aug 2026
7 new faces, and Gazelle are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
Transfer targets10 Aug 2026
A loan move for Joël Djingar is in the works
Gazelle have made the call to AS PSI. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.