Marked for Abdullah Al-Juhani
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market15 Feb 2027
“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 The request is on a desk at Al-Mojzel, and it is not being withdrawn.
Player ratings15 Feb 2027
Defensive actions: 24. He was first to everything and second to nothing, and the goalkeeper had an easy day because of it.
Squad15 Feb 2027
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-Mojzel this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Match13 Feb 2027
A 1‑0 win over Al-Batin, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Squad15 Feb 2027
Mohammed Al-Harbi 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.
Player ratings15 Feb 2027
18 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.
Squad15 Feb 2027
“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 ratings15 Feb 2027
Some games turn on a moment; this one turned on a man. 7.91 on the card, and the Al-Mojzel support went home talking about one name.
Squad15 Feb 2027
Thiago Queiroz has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at Al-Mojzel 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.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market2 Nov 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.
Player ratings2 Nov 2026
Defensive actions: 22. He was first to everything and second to nothing, and the goalkeeper had an easy day because of it.
Player ratings2 Nov 2026
Ninety minutes of Thiago Queiroz at his very best
Marked 8.75. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Al-Mojzel.
Match31 Oct 2026
Al-Batin made Al-Mojzel work for it, but the scoreboard read 1‑0 at the end and the table does not ask how.
Player ratings2 Nov 2026
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.39, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
Squad2 Nov 2026
“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.
Player ratings2 Nov 2026
Successful dribbles: 16. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad2 Nov 2026
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-Mojzel this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad2 Nov 2026
A place in the month's best eleven for Waleed Al-Enezi
Four or five weekends of consistency, judged against everybody in the division doing his job. Waleed Al-Enezi has come out of that comparison in the side, and Al-Mojzel have had the benefit of every one of those afternoons.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad7 Sep 2026
A knee injury of the worst kind for Omar Al-Sultan
27 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Al-Mojzel lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Market7 Sep 2026
“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 Al-Mojzel, and it is not being withdrawn.
Player ratings7 Sep 2026
A first appearance Sami Al-Juhani will want to forget — 5.50
Everybody's debut is one of two stories and this was the other one. 5.50, 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.
Squad7 Sep 2026
Thiago Queiroz 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.
Squad7 Sep 2026
Mohammed Al-Juhani 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.
Squad7 Sep 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Abdullah Al-Juhani, and the manager let it.
Player ratings7 Sep 2026
Successful dribbles: 15. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Match5 Sep 2026
Nil-nil, and few chances worth the name. Al-Saudi Al-Watani came to defend and left with exactly what they came for.
Player ratings7 Sep 2026
5.65 on the card. Some afternoons a footballer looks like a man who has only just been introduced to the game, and this was one of them.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
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
Saad Al-Nemer has left for Al-Khaleej in a $1.6M deal. The accountants are pleased; the supporters are less certain.
Market24 Aug 2026
Al-Mojzel say no — this time
The offer from Ohod for Youssef Al-Rashid was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
Squad24 Aug 2026
Thiago Queiroz 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
“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.
Squad24 Aug 2026
Words at Al-Mojzel training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Sultan Al-Sulami 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.
Player ratings24 Aug 2026
Successful dribbles: 13. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Player ratings24 Aug 2026
7 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.