Marked for Timothy Olunga
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad5 Oct 2026
A knee injury of the worst kind for Timothy Olunga
15 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Kenya Police lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Yves Koutiama 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.
Boardroom5 Oct 2026
Wages eat 294% of everything Kenya Police earn
There is a figure at which a wage bill stops being ambitious and becomes the reason nothing else is possible, and this club has reached it. Nothing is left over for a transfer, a stand or a rainy afternoon.
Match3 Oct 2026
5 matches without a win, and then this, against Posta Rangers. Relief is a strange noise in a football ground and it was the only noise at the end.
Match3 Oct 2026
It finished 1‑0, and it was Erick Zakayo’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Kenya Police.
Player ratings5 Oct 2026
A performance of 8.11 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
Squad5 Oct 2026
39 days, the medical staff say, and medical staff are optimists by profession. The team sheet will look wrong without him.
Squad5 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 Kenya Police this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Player ratings5 Oct 2026
Awesu Awesu beats them one at a time
Successful dribbles: 16. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad28 Sep 2026
22 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Kenya Police lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Match26 Sep 2026
5 matches without a win for Kenya Police
The run now stands at 5, and the questions being asked around Kenya Police are no longer polite ones.
Squad28 Sep 2026
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Yves Koutiama was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Squad28 Sep 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 Kenya Police this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The dugout28 Sep 2026
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Dennis Okoth after 1‑3, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
Squad28 Sep 2026
5 new faces, and Kenya Police 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.
The dugout28 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.
The dugout28 Sep 2026
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad21 Sep 2026
Timothy Olunga damages knee ligaments — 29 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 29 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.
Match19 Sep 2026
4 matches without a win for Kenya Police
The run now stands at 4, and the questions being asked around Kenya Police are no longer polite ones.
Transfer targets21 Sep 2026
Kenya Police offered $21.0K; Tusker said it was not close. The manager will be told the money is still there for the right player, which is what managers are told.
Match19 Sep 2026
Nairobi United left with the points after a 0‑1 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Squad21 Sep 2026
Marvin Nabwire and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
The dugout21 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.
The dugout21 Sep 2026
The manager’s verdict
“That is on me. I pick the team and I picked wrong.” Managers say that when they mean it and when they need to be seen to, and after 0‑1 Dennis Okoth left the room before anybody could ask which.
Looking ahead21 Sep 2026
The leaders are next for Kenya Police
Kakamega Homeboyz top the table and they are coming into view. Nothing to lose, which is what every manager says before losing.
The dugout21 Sep 2026
Somebody else has been better, the manager has said so with a team sheet, and there is no argument to be had. He will get the shirt back the only way it can be got back.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad14 Sep 2026
A knee injury of the worst kind for Timothy Olunga
36 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Kenya Police lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Transfer targets14 Sep 2026
Tusker wanted more than $26.0K and the board would not go there. Walked away, for now, which in a transfer window means until somebody blinks.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Yves Koutiama was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout14 Sep 2026
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 1‑3, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
The dugout14 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.
The dugout14 Sep 2026
Nobody will confirm this and nothing else explains the last month of selections. A costly error buys a player a period of being second choice that is always longer than the error was.
The dugout14 Sep 2026
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Hernest Malonga is on it.
Player ratings14 Sep 2026
Successful dribbles: 11. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.