Marked for Youri De Ketelaere
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market5 Oct 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.
Squad5 Oct 2026
“The easiest signature of my career.” Youri De Ketelaere and Sioni agree another 1 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Alam Garcete in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sioni this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad5 Oct 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Youri De Ketelaere, and the manager let it.
Market5 Oct 2026
Still no offer on the table, and Youri De Ketelaere’s deal keeps shrinking. In boardroom language, silence this long stops being an oversight and starts being an answer.
Boardroom5 Oct 2026
87% of the income goes out in wages at Sioni
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.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Player ratings21 Sep 2026
Successful dribbles: 22. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad21 Sep 2026
Alam Garcete in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sioni this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Match19 Sep 2026
Alam Garcete scored, and precious little else went right: 2‑3 to Zugdidi, and a quiet walk to the dressing room.
Squad21 Sep 2026
Bantu Mzwakali 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.
Squad21 Sep 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 ratings21 Sep 2026
Marked 8.00. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Sioni.
Squad21 Sep 2026
8 new faces, and Sioni are still learning each other
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.
Market21 Sep 2026
At 35, he has seen every situation this season can produce, twice. The legs will be managed; the head is the purchase.
Market21 Sep 2026
Nobody sells a season ticket on a signing like this. Every manager who has been through a bad October wants one anyway, and Sioni have gone and got theirs early.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match12 Sep 2026
4 matches without a win for Lokeren
The run now stands at 4, and the questions being asked around Lokeren are no longer polite ones.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Words at Lokeren training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Radja Alderweireld 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.
Match12 Sep 2026
Beaten 0‑2, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Squad14 Sep 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.
Loan watch14 Sep 2026
“I did not go to Waasland-Beveren to sit and watch. I want to come back to Lokeren and fight for my place.” 0 appearances in 5 matches say the rest.
Squad14 Sep 2026
The manager has not finished forgetting Maximilian Schumacher's mistake
Publicly it is behind everybody. It is not behind the man who picks the team, and the only place that shows is a team sheet. He will get another chance; he will get it in a match that matters less.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Jorrit Smeets knocks on the manager's door
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Lokeren, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Player ratings14 Sep 2026
Successful dribbles: 11. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Market14 Sep 2026
The window shut and Nacer Hazard is still in the building
Lokeren spent a month trying to move him and nobody rang back. He trains with a squad that has told him where he stands, and both sides start counting down to the next one.