Marked for Hamdan Saeed
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad31 Jul 2028
Mohamed Suqrat damages knee ligaments — 43 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 43 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.
Squad31 Jul 2028
A fracture rules Hamdan Saeed out for 19 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Al Shaab will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Squad31 Jul 2028
Bruno Ferreyra 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.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad24 Jul 2028
Mohamed Suqrat damages knee ligaments — 50 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 50 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.
Squad24 Jul 2028
Hamdan Saeed breaks a bone — 27 days out
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 27 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Squad24 Jul 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Al Shaab this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad17 Jul 2028
A fracture rules Hamdan Saeed out for 37 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Al Shaab will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Market17 Jul 2028
Partizan pay $7.8M, and the deal is done. The number reads well on a balance sheet; whether it reads well on the pitch is next season's question.
The terraces17 Jul 2028
Supporters turn on the $7.8M sale of Ibrahim Al Shamsi
He is going to Partizan, the club has $7.8M it did not have on Friday, and the phone-ins have already decided how they feel about that. Selling well and selling somebody they loved are not the same skill.
Market17 Jul 2028
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Santiago Benítez wants continental football; whether Al Shaab can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
Squad17 Jul 2028
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and Al Shaab know it.
Squad17 Jul 2028
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Saif Nasser is 22, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market10 Jul 2028
The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.
Squad10 Jul 2028
A fracture rules Hamdan Saeed out for 44 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Al Shaab will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Squad10 Jul 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Al Shaab this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad10 Jul 2028
Words at Al Shaab training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Matías Molina 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.
Squad10 Jul 2028
At 27 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.
Market10 Jul 2028
Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Hamad Al Naqbi’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad3 Jul 2028
Hamdan Saeed breaks a bone — 52 days out
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 52 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Market3 Jul 2028
Add another name to the list: Middlesbrough have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Ibrahim Al Shamsi. The answer from Al Shaab has not changed — yet.
Market3 Jul 2028
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Al Shaab is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad3 Jul 2028
Bruno Ferreyra 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.
Squad3 Jul 2028
“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; Al Shaab are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Squad3 Jul 2028
Words at Al Shaab training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Adrian Şut 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.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad26 Jun 2028
A fracture rules Hamdan Saeed out for 60 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Al Shaab will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Squad26 Jun 2028
“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.
Squad26 Jun 2028
Omar Hassan 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.