Marked for Thomas Hazard
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market19 Jul 2027
“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.
Squad19 Jul 2027
Jens Cools 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.
Market19 Jul 2027
Mouscron pay $690.0K, 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.
Squad19 Jul 2027
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Abdelkahar Kadri trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Market19 Jul 2027
“They were honest with me, and I would rather know.” Hans Fellaini has been informed he is not in the manager's thinking at Lokeren.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad26 Apr 2027
Jens Cools 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.
Squad26 Apr 2027
“The easiest signature of my career.” Lois Tielemans and Lokeren agree another 4 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Loan watch26 Apr 2027
“I did not go to Austria Wien to sit and watch. I want to come back to Lokeren and fight for my place.” 12 appearances in 36 matches say the rest.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad19 Apr 2027
Thomas Hazard: that is not what I was promised
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Lokeren have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Squad19 Apr 2027
Jens Cools 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.
Market19 Apr 2027
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Lokeren know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad22 Feb 2027
“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.
Squad22 Feb 2027
Jens Cools 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.
Squad22 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.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad26 Oct 2026
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 6 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Match24 Oct 2026
5 matches without a win for Lokeren
The run now stands at 5, and the questions being asked around Lokeren are no longer polite ones.
Squad26 Oct 2026
A season average of 7.07 at an age when most of his year group are still in the youth team. Lokeren know what they have, and so, by now, does everybody else.
Player ratings26 Oct 2026
Successful dribbles: 22. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad26 Oct 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 Lokeren this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Player ratings26 Oct 2026
A performance of 8.90 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
Player ratings26 Oct 2026
Marked 8.51 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
Squad26 Oct 2026
The medical room confirms 21 days on the sidelines for Thomas Hazard, and a plan built around him now has to be rebuilt.
Match24 Oct 2026
It needed Adnan Tielemans to find the net to bring anything home at all: 1‑1 against Sint-Truiden, and half the dressing room will call it a point won.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad28 Sep 2026
Thomas Hazard: that is not what I was promised
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Lokeren have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Squad28 Sep 2026
He is 20, he is averaging 7.00, and older professionals have started passing to him in the difficult minutes. That last part is the real scouting report.
Squad28 Sep 2026
Jens Cools 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 Lokeren this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad28 Sep 2026
53 days, the scan says, and scans are kinder than reality. The fixtures in that window have just become somebody else’s job.
Player ratings28 Sep 2026
Successful dribbles: 19. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Match26 Sep 2026
0‑1 to KV Mechelen, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market31 Aug 2026
The unthinkable, invoiced: Lois Vanaken sold
VfB Stuttgart arrived with $12.2M and left with the best player in the building. The board will call it business; the queue at the ticket office will use other words.
Match26 Aug 2026
Lokeren bow out of the cup
Racing Genk go through and Lokeren go home, 0‑1 the scoreline that did it. The dressing room will call the league the priority now, because that is what dressing rooms say.
Player ratings31 Aug 2026
Successful dribbles: 27. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Market31 Aug 2026
Nacer Vanaken hands in a written request
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Lokeren can pretend not to have heard.
Market31 Aug 2026
Mouscron pay $620.0K, 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.
Squad31 Aug 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 Lokeren this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Match29 Aug 2026
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Lois Vanaken. 2‑1 against OH Leuven, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Player ratings31 Aug 2026
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.68, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market3 Aug 2026
Lokeren say no — this time
The offer from Sturm Graz for Thomas De Bruyne 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.
Player ratings3 Aug 2026
Successful dribbles: 22. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Samuel Fernandes 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.
Player ratings3 Aug 2026
A performance of 8.25 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
Market3 Aug 2026
The interest is real enough to have reached print. Lokeren have said nothing, which in a transfer window is its own kind of answer.
Squad3 Aug 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Thomas Hazard, and the manager let it.
Match1 Aug 2026
2‑2, and both dressing rooms will call it two points lost. A draw that asked plenty of questions and answered none of them.
Squad3 Aug 2026
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Dries Batshuayi trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Player ratings3 Aug 2026
Marked 4.59, and generously at that. Nothing came off, and by the end the crowd had stopped expecting it to.