The words a physio says slowly. 20 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.
Djihad Bizimana 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.
In brief
SquadWords at CS Constantine training over how hard people work
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at CS Constantine this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
35 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. CS Constantine lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
42 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. CS Constantine lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a 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.
Tosin Omoyele 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 no crueller way to lose a football match. CS Constantine scored in the 95th minute, the restart barely happened, and the away end was still standing when the whistle went.
“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 The request is on a desk at CS Constantine, and it is not being withdrawn.
Boardroom7 Sep 2026
2 academy players handed senior numbers at CS Constantine
The morning the pathway stops being a brochure and becomes a team sheet. Most of them will not be here in three years; all of them have already done the hard part, which was getting to today.
Squad7 Sep 2026
Words at CS Constantine training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Messala Merbah 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.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Ali Bensebaini is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Adam Belmadi is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
18 defensive actions and a clean sheet at the end of them. A defender's afternoon can only be told by what did not happen, which is why nobody makes a highlights package out of one and every manager in the division would take 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 CS Constantine this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.