Marked for Patrick Mohammed
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Boardroom8 Sep 2031
He arrived for a fee and leaves for a fraction of it. $49.6K of what Berekum Chelsea paid for Kelvin Asenso is money the club will not see again, and the boardroom will be asked about it for two seasons.
Market8 Sep 2031
“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.
Squad8 Sep 2031
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Michael Acquaye and Berekum Chelsea agree another 3 years.
Squad8 Sep 2031
Kwesi Sorotu Badori 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.
Boardroom8 Sep 2031
7 boys move up, and somewhere in the building the people who coached them at twelve are quietly having the best morning of their working year. Nothing about this shows up in a result and it is why the academy exists.
Transfer targets8 Sep 2031
A deal that was a phone call from completion at lunchtime was dead by midnight. Berekum Chelsea will try again when the window opens; Asante Kotoko may not be selling by then.
Market8 Sep 2031
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Albert Paintsil has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
Market8 Sep 2031
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Kwame Partey has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
Market8 Sep 2031
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Jonathan Asante is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
The terraces2 Jun 2031
Anger at Berekum Chelsea spills outside the ground
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.
Match2 Jun 2031
Position 14, 26 points, and a fixture list with fewer games left in it than excuses. The arithmetic is not cruel yet, but it has stopped being kind.
Market2 Jun 2031
“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 Berekum Chelsea, and it is not being withdrawn.
Boardroom2 Jun 2031
The silence upstairs is getting loud at Berekum Chelsea
Nobody on the board has said anything against the manager, which is the point — they have stopped saying anything for him either.
Squad2 Jun 2031
“The easiest signature of my career.” Rashid Sumaila and Berekum Chelsea agree another 2 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Squad2 Jun 2031
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Berekum Chelsea this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The dugout2 Jun 2031
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 dugout2 Jun 2031
“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.
Boardroom2 Jun 2031
The money the manager was told he had is now money the manager used to have. $1.6M, gone from the table without a statement, and a dressing room that understands what it means.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match5 Apr 2031
No end in sight to Berekum Chelsea's wait for a win
9 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Berekum Chelsea has to find a result from somewhere.
Match7 Apr 2031
Position 14, 25 points, and a fixture list with fewer games left in it than excuses. The arithmetic is not cruel yet, but it has stopped being kind.
Match5 Apr 2031
6 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 dugout7 Apr 2031
“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.
Squad7 Apr 2031
Seidu Abubakar and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Squad7 Apr 2031
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Inusah Adam commits to Berekum Chelsea for another 3 years.
Squad7 Apr 2031
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Kwesi Sorotu Badori was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Match5 Apr 2031
0‑1 to WAFA, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
The dugout7 Apr 2031
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Michael Acquaye, and the manager let it.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Boardroom2 Sep 2030
The end came on a Tuesday, as these things usually do: a short meeting, a shorter statement, and Interim Coach clearing his office by noon. Football’s cruellest ritual, performed to schedule.
Boardroom2 Sep 2030
Berekum Chelsea have nobody left to take training
Not an interim appointment — an institution with an empty coaching office. Somebody unfamiliar will run the sessions this week, and the question of how a club gets into this state is one the board will be asked and will not answer.
Boardroom2 Sep 2030
“I am not thinking past Saturday, and I would advise nobody else to.” The caretaker’s first rule is to pretend the job is small; Interim Coach recited it perfectly.
Boardroom2 Sep 2030
Deadline passes with 6 signed and 11 gone
That is the business done at Berekum Chelsea until the window opens again. Whether it was enough will be answered on Saturdays rather than in a column, and the first Saturday is close.
Squad2 Sep 2030
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Berekum Chelsea this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Transfer targets2 Sep 2030
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Hasaacas have kept their man, and Berekum Chelsea go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Squad2 Sep 2030
Eric Ofori-Antwi 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.
Market2 Sep 2030
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Afriyie Gyan has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
Market2 Sep 2030
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Patrick Mohammed is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.