The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around BA All Stars people have started saying his name in the past tense.
“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 The request is on a desk at BA All Stars, and it is not being withdrawn.
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.
Daddy Abdulrahman 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.
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.
Everyone has stopped pretending: Berekum Chelsea will make the call about Yaw Paintsil this week. BA All Stars have a number in mind, and the number is not shy.
“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 The request is on a desk at BA All Stars, and it is not being withdrawn.
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around BA All Stars people have started saying his name in the past tense.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Amos Afful will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around BA All Stars the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Daddy Abdulrahman 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 6.90 on 10 actions at both ends of the pitch. Midfielders like this get described as unspectacular by people who have never tried to play against one.
Squad24 Jan 2028
Words at BA All Stars training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Abdul Atiemo 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.
There were 88 minutes on the clock and Berekum Chelsea had all but banked the point. Football rarely reads the room, and BA All Stars did not stop to explain themselves.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Abdul Atiemo will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around BA All Stars the goodbyes have quietly begun.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at BA All Stars this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Kwame Sulemana was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: David Andrew. 2‑1 against Berekum Chelsea, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
He is 22 and the ground already sings his name, which is a thing that happens to local boys and almost never to signings. Everything from here is measured against an affection he did nothing to earn except be from here.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around BA All Stars they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
At 22 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.
He won it back and then made something of it, which is two jobs and the reason the scoreline looks the way it does. 11 combined actions and a mark of 6.71, and not one of them will make a highlights package.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Christian Boateng was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Nobody upstairs has said anything, which is the loudest thing they could do. Results buy silence in this game; the account at BA All Stars is running low.
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.
Nobody at BA All Stars will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
“I respect the manager and I am not going to sit here and pretend I am happy.” It is the most common sentence in football and it has never once been the end of a story.
The directors have stopped offering the manager public warmth. In football that is usually the stage before the short statement.
The terraces19 Jul 2027
Supporters organise against the BA All Stars board
A bad atmosphere can be waited out. A group of people meeting afterwards to decide what to do about it cannot, and everybody in the building knows which stage this is.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 25 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Abdul Atiemo was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
Daddy Abdulrahman 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.
6 goals in one match, David Andrew on the scoresheet, and a scoreline that will look like a misprint. Neutrals could not have asked more of BA All Stars and New Edubiase United.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Albert Afful 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Kwame Sulemana was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
9 combined actions and 6.93. 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.
David Andrew and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad16 Nov 2026
Albert Asante 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.
David Andrew 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.
Daddy Abdulrahman 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 19 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.
“It is not the end of the world and it is not good enough. Both of those are true.” The manager, after a 0‑0 draw, said the honest thing and then went to say it again inside.
The crowd waited for a goal that never came. Hearts of Oak defended in numbers and left with what they came for, and the two sides could be playing still without troubling a scorer.
Off the academy pitches and onto a senior team sheet at 18. The debut is the easy part; the second appearance is the one every young player has to earn.
12 shots, and a count that reads like a good afternoon until you check the other column. Strikers survive weeks like this on the understanding that the chances keep arriving; the day they stop is the day it becomes a problem.
Nobody at BA All Stars 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.
31 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. BA All Stars lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
The most common injury in the game and the most rushed back from. BA All Stars will quote 15 days and will be careful with it, because the second one is always worse than the first.
BA All Stars asked and WAFA said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Albert Asante was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.