A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. APS Bomet will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Sven Yidah 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 chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 3 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
A player who expected to start watched it instead. The manager will call it a decision for the team; Aziz Okaka will call it something else in private.
29 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. APS Bomet lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at APS Bomet this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Beaten 0‑1, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
The dugout26 Mar 2029
The view from the dugout
“We will look at it, we will learn from it, and we go again.” The three sentences every manager keeps for a 0‑1 defeat, delivered by Luis Álvarez to a room that had heard them before.
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.
It has stopped being a mood in the stands and started being something organised. Boards can ignore a bad atmosphere for a long time; they cannot ignore this stage of it for very long at all.
The board’s statement ran to three sentences and one of them mentioned results. Ochieng Odhiambo has managed long enough to translate: win soon, or the next statement is shorter.
Position 16 and 28 points, and the table gets read bottom-up in this part of town. The calendar has stopped being a schedule and started being a countdown.
Nothing has been announced and everybody understands what it means. A board that summons the whole football department on a Tuesday morning is a board that has stopped believing the problem will fix itself.
“They were honest with me, and I would rather know.” Morgan Ambuka has been informed he is not in the manager's thinking at APS Bomet.
Squad2 Oct 2028
A place in the month's best eleven for Patrick Njeru
Four or five weekends of consistency, judged against everybody in the division doing his job. Patrick Njeru has come out of that comparison in the side, and APS Bomet have had the benefit of every one of those afternoons.
In brief
The dugoutMorgan Ambuka asks for a word with the manager
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what APS Bomet can pretend not to have heard.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Ochieng Odhiambo after 1‑2, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
The mood at APS Bomet has turned into something else
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the whole of the defence. 8 saves, several of them the kind nobody expects to see made, and ten outfield players who owe him a drink.
“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 APS Bomet, and it is not being withdrawn.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at APS Bomet this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Ochieng Odhiambo after 0‑1, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at APS Bomet, and both men came out saying it was fine.