Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 101 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
“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 The request is on a desk at Bumprom Gomel, and it is not being withdrawn.
Wages have outrun income and the accountants have started attending meetings they used to send apologies to. Ambition comes second in a season like this.
5 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.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Bumprom Gomel this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The instruction has come from upstairs rather than from the dugout, which is the version of this conversation no manager enjoys. Somebody in that squad is now available whether the man who picks the team thinks so or not.
Thomas Appiah 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 was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Bumprom Gomel has been clear about where Dmitriy Krivosheev stands, which is more than many ever get.
The words a physio says slowly. 63 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.
“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 The request is on a desk at Bumprom Gomel, and it is not being withdrawn.
“Some mornings you wake up and you are still a long way from everything you know.” It is not the football and it never was; Bumprom Gomel are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Bumprom Gomel this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad7 Feb 2028
Words at Bumprom Gomel training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Nikita Ovsyanik 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.
Boardroom7 Feb 2028
105% of the income goes out in wages at Bumprom Gomel
Every club in football pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time somebody has tried it.
49 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. CotonTchad lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
At 35 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 7.85 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Meshack Maphangule 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.
21 times he got in the way of something. Centre-halves get written about when they make mistakes and ignored when they do not, so an afternoon like this needs saying out loud: he is the reason the scoreline reads as it does.
A 1‑0 win over Stars Jeunes Talents, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Squad24 Jan 2028
Saula Waqa 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.
56 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. CotonTchad lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
“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 CotonTchad, and it is not being withdrawn.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at CotonTchad this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Everyone has stopped pretending: Galactik will make the call about Idriss Souleymane this week. CotonTchad have a number in mind, and the number is not shy.
63 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. CotonTchad lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at CotonTchad this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
It finished 1‑1, and it somehow always looked like it would. One of those afternoons where the table moves less than the tempers.
Squad10 Jan 2028
Words at CotonTchad training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Idriss Souleymane 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.
In brief
Player ratingsAn afternoon Saula Waqa will want back
The words a physio says slowly. 77 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.
Bob Cetric 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.
92 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. CotonTchad lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at CotonTchad this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
A 1‑0 win over Elect Sport, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Squad13 Dec 2027
Words at CotonTchad training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Saula Waqa 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.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 16 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
36 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. CotonTchad lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at CotonTchad this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad15 Nov 2027
Words at CotonTchad training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Bob Cetric 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.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. CotonTchad know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
The words a physio says slowly. 25 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at CotonTchad this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. CotonTchad know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
The words a physio says slowly. 32 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.
Meshack Maphangule 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.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Seth Clark signs something — a contract at CotonTchad or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Still no offer on the table, and Abdul Aziz’s deal keeps shrinking. In boardroom language, silence this long stops being an oversight and starts being an answer.
Marked 5.76. Nothing he attempted worked and by the hour mark he had stopped attempting much, which is the part a manager notices rather than the mistakes.
The words a physio says slowly. 114 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.
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.
89 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. CotonTchad lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 21 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.
Nothing happens for months and then he simply arrives, at no cost, having signed a pre-contract while still turning out for somebody else. It is the least dramatic way to sign a footballer and frequently the shrewdest.
Squad16 Aug 2027
Bob Cetric 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at CotonTchad this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” CotonTchad have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
The board have answered with money instead of encouragement, which is the only answer a manager ever wants. Spending it well is now entirely his problem.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. CotonTchad know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at CotonTchad, and both men came out saying it was fine.
43 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. CotonTchad lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 88 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Finn McKenlay 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.
Squad15 Feb 2027
Stephen Okola has improved at 29, 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.
57 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. CotonTchad lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 102 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Léger Djimrangar provided it, and the 8.18 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.55 at 36, and nobody on the pitch was better.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at CotonTchad this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Defending was optional and nobody took up the option. 6 goals between CotonTchad and AS Etat Major, and not one of the people who paid to be there will ask for the money back.
At 19 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.
In brief
Boardroom104% of the income goes out in wages at CotonTchad
Ernest Appiah 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.
6 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Hasaacas and Asante Kotoko in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
Marked 8.16. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Hasaacas.
Squad25 Jan 2027
Albert Nuhu 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.
Marked 5.63. Nothing he attempted worked and by the hour mark he had stopped attempting much, which is the part a manager notices rather than the mistakes.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Hasaacas will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
The terraces23 Nov 2026
The boos come down from three sides
“We pay for this every fortnight. The least we want is somebody who looks like he cares.” 9 of the 35 senior players walked off into it; the rest were not playing.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Hasaacas this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Marked 5.29. Nothing he attempted worked and by the hour mark he had stopped attempting much, which is the part a manager notices rather than the mistakes.