The offer from KAA Gent for Laurent Vertonghen 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.
The hardest thing about being 20 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Hans Witsel did not need any: 8.30, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
An individual honour is a strange thing in a team game, and the best of them are never argued with. He has had the sort of year that ends with his name being read out, and KV Oostende have had the benefit of it.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at KV Oostende this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Laurent Vertonghen. 5‑3 against Sint-Truiden, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
8 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about KV Oostende and Sint-Truiden in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
In brief
SquadWords at KV Oostende training over how hard people work
2 goals to the good, and then a slow surrender of everything that had been earned. Yannick Courtois will not be the one blamed for it, but nobody at KV Oostende escapes the conversation that follows a collapse like this.
The run now stands at 5, and the questions being asked around KV Oostende are no longer polite ones.
Squad7 Dec 2026
Words at KV Oostende training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. César De la Hoz 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at KV Oostende this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
8.60. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
Anderlecht go through and KV Oostende go home, 2‑2 the scoreline that did it. The dressing room will call the league the priority now, because that is what dressing rooms say.
A shoot-out is remembered by its ending, and this one ends with Thomas Mignolet: 1 kept out, and a set of supporters who will describe every one of them for the next twenty years.
The hardest thing about being 20 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Hans Witsel did not need any: 7.77, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
He is 20, he is averaging 7.15, and older professionals have started passing to him in the difficult minutes. That last part is the real scouting report.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at KV Oostende this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad30 Nov 2026
Perr Schuurs 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.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 7 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Hans Witsel 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.
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.
Position 2, 26 points, and the result everyone checks first is now theirs. The word is still not being said around the ground, which is how you know everyone is thinking it.
The hardest thing about being 20 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Hans Witsel did not need any: 8.28, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at KV Oostende this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
6 games unbeaten now. Some were earned and some were survived, but a habit is forming — and habits are the hardest thing in football to play against.
Squad26 Oct 2026
Words at KV Oostende training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. César De la Hoz 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.
At 20 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.
15 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. KV Oostende 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 KV Oostende this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
A month is long enough that nobody gets in by accident. Yannick Courtois is in the division's best eleven for it, which is a quieter compliment than an award and a more reliable one.
Ninety minutes, no goals, and the argument started before the car park emptied: a point gained, or two thrown away against Anderlecht? Both sides of it will still be going on Thursday.
29 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. KV Oostende lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Sint-Truiden will want this one forgotten quickly: 3‑0, every duel lost, and a long ride home. KV Oostende were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Thorgan Vertonghen provided it, and the 9.04 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at KV Oostende this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad21 Sep 2026
Words at KV Oostende training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Thomas Delaine 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.
Marked 8.17. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at KV Oostende.
Squad21 Sep 2026
8 new faces, and KV Oostende 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.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Hans Witsel signs something — a contract at KV Oostende or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.