Marked for Mahamat Ngaradoumbe
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad8 Mar 2027
A fracture rules Mahamat Doungous out for 106 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason AS Etat Major will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Player ratings8 Mar 2027
A brace, and Adam Oumar takes the afternoon — 8.42
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Adam Oumar provided it, and the 8.42 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Player ratings8 Mar 2027
Narcisse Oumar, 18, plays like he has been here for years — 7.72
A mark of 7.72 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 18-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Market8 Mar 2027
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at AS Etat Major is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Match6 Mar 2027
No end in sight to AS Etat Major's wait for a win
4 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at AS Etat Major has to find a result from somewhere.
Squad8 Mar 2027
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Ali Haroun and AS Etat Major agree another 4 years.
Squad8 Mar 2027
16 goals and a season average of 7.22. Form like that gets noticed well beyond this town.
Squad8 Mar 2027
Ali Haroun 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 AS Etat Major this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Player ratings8 Mar 2027
Successful dribbles: 19. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Crisis
The terraces1 Feb 2027
The mood at AS Etat Major has turned into something else
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
Player ratings1 Feb 2027
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 9.01, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
Squad1 Feb 2027
A fracture rules Ahmat Haroun out for 17 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason AS Etat Major will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Market1 Feb 2027
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
Squad1 Feb 2027
A season average of 7.48 with 17 goals behind it. Opponents have started planning around him, which is the sincerest compliment football pays.
Boardroom1 Feb 2027
Nobody upstairs has said anything, which is the loudest thing they could do. Results buy silence in this game; the account at AS Etat Major is running low.
Market1 Feb 2027
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at AS Etat Major is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad1 Feb 2027
Adam Oumar 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 AS Etat Major this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Match30 Jan 2027
2‑3 to CotonTchad, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Player ratings14 Dec 2026
Successful dribbles: 30. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad14 Dec 2026
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 6 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Player ratings14 Dec 2026
Ahmat Allamine, 20, plays like he has been here for years — 7.68
A mark of 7.68 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 20-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Market14 Dec 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.
Market14 Dec 2026
Moussa Abakar has one foot out of the door
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around AS Etat Major they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Match12 Dec 2026
4 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.
Squad14 Dec 2026
Hassan Tokindang 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.
Match12 Dec 2026
4 matches, two or more conceded in every one of them. Sides that create as much as this can live with it for a while. Nobody lives with it forever.
Squad14 Dec 2026
Ali 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.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad31 Aug 2026
Althaf Alrizky 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.
Squad31 Aug 2026
Benjamin Ngakoutou 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.
Squad31 Aug 2026
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Marius Haroun commits to Galactik for another 3 years.
Market31 Aug 2026
AS Algoy are about to pick up the phone
A conversation is coming this week. Galactik will put a number on him, and from there it stops being football and becomes arithmetic.
Squad31 Aug 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Oumar Ngaradoumbe, and the manager let it.
Market31 Aug 2026
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Damian Overmeyer signs something — a contract at Galactik or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market24 Aug 2026
The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.
Market24 Aug 2026
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
Market24 Aug 2026
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at AS Etat Major is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad24 Aug 2026
Adam Oumar 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.
Squad24 Aug 2026
The manager makes an example of Moussa Djimet
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
Squad24 Aug 2026
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Hassan Allamine commits to AS Etat Major for another 3 years.