At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 7.83 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
16 goals and a season average of 7.30 will do that. The space he used to find has gone; he keeps scoring anyway, which is the mark of the real thing.
Squad8 Feb 2027
Words at Mouscron training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Mousa Vanaken 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.
Dino Arslanagić 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 words a physio says slowly. 27 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.
“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 The request is on a desk at Lokeren, and it is not being withdrawn.
Kevin Vanaken 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.
Mouscron paid $250.0K and Lokeren took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
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.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.52 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Tobe Leysen 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.
Squad1 Feb 2027
Mousa Vanaken 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.
42 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Lokeren lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Kevin De Bruyne provided it, and the 8.30 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Diego Arriaga has just signed for Lokeren, and for once the answer mattered.
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.
Romelu Batshuayi 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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Kevin De Bruyne 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.
The words a physio says slowly. 59 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.
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 Lokeren have had the benefit of it.
Kevin Vanaken 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.
3 games without scoring. Strikers stop looking up, midfielders take the extra touch, and every shot that clears the bar is followed by a groan that has been building since the last goal.
The offer from KAA Gent for Hans Nainggolan 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.
Michaël Heylen 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.
7 signings in three months. Every one of them may be an upgrade and the team can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild that never appears in the transfer-window verdicts.
There is no complaint available here and everybody involved knows it, which does not make the walk to the bench any shorter. Form is the only currency in football that cannot be borrowed against.
The crowd waited for a goal that never came. Zulte Waregem defended in numbers and left with what they came for, and the two sides could be playing still without troubling a scorer.
The terraces24 Aug 2026
Supporters make their feelings known about Kevin Vanaken
The speculation has reached the stands, and the stands have answered. Lokeren would like this settled before it becomes the only thing anybody asks about.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 8 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
The phone has started ringing about Kevin Januzaj again, and this time the name on the line is Ajax. Lokeren are listening politely and promising nothing.
Leander Castagne 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.
6 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Lokeren and KV Oostende in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
Successful dribbles: 19. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Words at Lokeren training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Christian Witsel 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.
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Thorgan Mignolet has his answer from Lokeren; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
In brief
The terracesThe stands have heard the Kevin Januzaj talk too