$280.0K is a serious amount of money and it does not play centre-forward. Everybody in the dressing room knows who used to be looked at when it went wrong.
He is going to Persebaya, the club has $280.0K it did not have on Friday, and the phone-ins have already decided how they feel about that. Selling well and selling somebody they loved are not the same skill.
Borneo asked and Utrecht said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Mohamad Anez signs something — a contract at Borneo or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Persebaya this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
$58.0K on the table at Persis. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
Persebaya asked and Persis said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Squad25 Jan 2027
Words at Persebaya training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Léo Lelis 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.
The most common injury in the game and the most rushed back from. Persebaya will quote 15 days and will be careful with it, because the second one is always worse than the first.
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.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Borneo have lost him in all but the paperwork.
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: Willem II keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Borneo this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad18 Jan 2027
Words at Borneo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Marcos Astina 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.
The system has changed and his position has not. A footballer can improve his form; he cannot improve the manager’s formation, and that is the whole of the problem.
“I have done everything asked of me in training and it has not changed a thing on a Saturday.” The most familiar complaint in football, and one Borneo will have to answer with minutes or with a transfer.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Persebaya can pretend not to have heard.
The deal with Borneo is done in every sense but the one that puts him on the pitch. Nothing goes wrong at this stage, except on the occasions when it 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 Persebaya this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
$57.0K was the most the club would pay and Persis were asking for more. Deals like this are revived in the last week of a window roughly half the time, and everybody involved knows it.
Squad18 Jan 2027
Words at Persebaya training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jefferson 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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Arema have kept their man, and Persebaya go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
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 Francisco Rivera is on it.
Every shape has positions in it and this one does not have his. Persebaya will either change the shape, change his job, or change his club, and he is waiting to hear which.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Borneo can pretend not to have heard.
Marcos Astina 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.
Borneo asked and Willem II said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation Borneo are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.
Borneo have made the call to De Graafschap. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Clement Benhaddouche and Borneo agree another 1 years.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Dika Kuswardani was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
There are footballers who have a good season and footballers a season is remembered for, and the second kind get their names read out in a hall in the summer. Borneo will be quietly delighted and privately nervous.
The deal with Madura United is done in every sense but the one that puts him on the pitch. Nothing goes wrong at this stage, except on the occasions when it 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 Borneo this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Clement Benhaddouche has just signed for Borneo, and for once the answer mattered.
He will be fined, he will apologise, and he will play on Saturday. The order of those three tells you everything about what a football club actually values.
“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 dugout4 Jan 2027
The manager has not finished forgetting Syahrul Trisna's mistake
Publicly it is behind everybody. It is not behind the man who picks the team, and the only place that shows is a team sheet. He will get another chance; he will get it in a match that matters less.
This is the season the town will measure the next twenty against. The trophy travels home with the squad, and the route through the streets was agreed days ago.
The kind of year that ends with a name being read out in a hall. Borneo had the benefit of it every week and now have the problem of everybody else knowing.
Squad21 Dec 2026
Words at Borneo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Marcos Astina 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Kaio Nunes was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Every club in football pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time somebody has tried 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 Borneo, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Marcos Astina 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.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Borneo, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Two goals and a mark of 8.27 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
“Some mornings you wake up and you are still a long way from everything you know.” It is not the football and it never was; Borneo are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Kadú 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.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Words at Borneo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Marcos Astina 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.
Every club in football pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time somebody has tried it.
7 signings in three months. Every one of them may be an upgrade and the team can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild that never appears in the transfer-window verdicts.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Chris Nduwarugira provided it, and the 8.29 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Marcos Astina 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.
“We earned that. I asked them for a reaction and I got one, and now I want the same again on Saturday.” Rizky Saddil on a 4‑0 afternoon that pleased him more than he was prepared to show.
Persik next, and one man in the Borneo dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought of him.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Mohamad Anez trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
“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 Borneo, and it is not being withdrawn.
Borneo had done everything except persuade the man himself. He stays at PSV, and the manager goes back to the drawing board with the money still in the bank.
Marcos Astina 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.
Borneo asked and Eibar said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Nobody will confirm it and the team sheets confirm it every week. One error has bought him a spell as second choice that is already longer than the error deserved.