Marked for Raphaël Anaba
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market31 Aug 2026
FC Diarra come back empty-handed
The bid was some way short and Fortuna Mfou did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Market31 Aug 2026
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Fortuna Mfou is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Transfer targets31 Aug 2026
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Fortuna Mfou have done the hard part with Fauve Azur Elite, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
Transfer targets31 Aug 2026
The approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.
Squad31 Aug 2026
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Raphaël Anaba was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Squad31 Aug 2026
Gérard Zanga 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.
Squad31 Aug 2026
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation Fortuna Mfou are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.
The dugout31 Aug 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Ari Tiente, and the manager let it.
Squad31 Aug 2026
He trains hard, says the right things and goes home to an empty flat. Nobody at Fortuna Mfou has done anything wrong, which is exactly what makes it so difficult to fix.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad10 Aug 2026
“The easiest signature of my career.” Zaharaddeen Bello and Fortuna Mfou agree another 3 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Squad10 Aug 2026
Words at Fortuna Mfou training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Raphaël Anaba 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.
Market10 Aug 2026
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Emmanuel Aboubakar 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.
Market10 Aug 2026
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Clinton Ngamaleu 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.
Market10 Aug 2026
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Eric Moukoudi is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Market10 Aug 2026
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Desire Bassogog 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.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market3 Aug 2026
The offer from Foullah Edifice for Aliou Souleyman Hendji was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
Squad3 Aug 2026
A move Zaharaddeen Bello would have made for nothing
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Zaharaddeen Bello is living that version at Fortuna Mfou, and it tends to show in the first month.
Squad3 Aug 2026
“The easiest signature of my career.” Zaharaddeen Bello and Fortuna Mfou agree another 3 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Aminou Bouba 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.
Market3 Aug 2026
The interest is real enough to have reached print. Fortuna Mfou have said nothing, which in a transfer window is its own kind of answer.
Market3 Aug 2026
Signings arrive with a picture of the club in their head, and this one’s picture was bigger than the building. He will play well and he will be gone, in that order, and everybody knows it.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Aminou Bouba has outgrown this division
There is a level at which a footballer stops being tested and starts being contained, and he reached it some time ago. Fortuna Mfou know it, and so does everybody who watches him.
Market3 Aug 2026
49 months left and silence from upstairs — no offer, no talks, nothing for his people to answer. Clubs that let a calendar do their negotiating usually end up negotiating with the calendar.
Transfer targets3 Aug 2026
A loan enquiry to Colombe du Dja et Lobo: cover, or a look at somebody the club cannot afford to buy yet. Either way the answer will come back inside the week.