Hakim Sulemana 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.
Marked 8.28 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
20 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Liberty Professionals lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
25 defensive actions and a clean sheet at the end of them. A defender's afternoon can only be told by what did not happen, which is why nobody makes a highlights package out of one and every manager in the division would take it.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Liberty Professionals this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Hakim Sulemana 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 Liberty Professionals, and 0 appearances in 26 say he has earned the hearing.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 22-year-old it feels ownership of. Hakim Sulemana has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
50 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Liberty Professionals lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Liberty Professionals have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Hakim Sulemana 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.
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 am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Liberty Professionals, and 0 appearances in 22 say he has earned the hearing.
89 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Liberty Professionals lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
2 goals to the good, and then a slow surrender of everything that had been earned. Kwame Paintsil will not be the one blamed for it, but nobody at Liberty Professionals escapes the conversation that follows a collapse like this.
Mohammed Fatau 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.
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 am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Liberty Professionals, and 0 appearances in 17 say he has earned the hearing.
Successful dribbles: 18. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Player ratings14 Dec 2026
Abraham Djiku 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.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.76 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Liberty Professionals this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Messie Biatoumoussoka 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.
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.
“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.
Player ratings16 Nov 2026
Abdul Kyereh was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.57. 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.
Player ratings16 Nov 2026
Abraham Djiku was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.56. 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.
A brace, and Afriyie Addo takes the afternoon — 8.38
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Afriyie Addo provided it, and the 8.38 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
6 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Liberty Professionals has to find a result from somewhere.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 22 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 Liberty Professionals this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
At 26 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 did not go to New Edubiase United to sit and watch. I want to come back to Liberty Professionals and fight for my place.” 0 appearances in 9 matches say the rest.
A first appearance Nana Inusah will want to forget — 5.71
Everybody's debut is one of two stories and this was the other one. 5.71, and the only consolation available is that nobody's career has ever been decided by ninety minutes in a shirt he had just been given.
Mohammed Fatau 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.
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.
Marked 8.39 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
“I did not go to New Edubiase United to sit and watch. I want to come back to Liberty Professionals and fight for my place.” 0 appearances in 5 matches say the rest.
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.
Ismail El Haddad 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.
He is doing things on a Saturday afternoon that nobody around him can answer, which is flattering for about one season and a problem after that. New Edubiase United will not keep him by pretending otherwise.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at New Edubiase United, another week without a signature from Wisdom Magbisa.
He trains hard, says the right things and goes home to an empty flat. Nobody at New Edubiase United has done anything wrong, which is exactly what makes it so difficult to fix.
A new face in his position, and Ramon Azeez suddenly has to win back what he thought he owned. New Edubiase United have promised nothing — clubs rarely do at this stage.
A season-long look at somebody else’s player: Albert Kwasi arrives from Hearts of Oak with something to prove and a return ticket in the drawer. Good loans make everybody richer; this one starts Saturday.