The board have said in public what they had been saying in private. Results between now and the next meeting decide it, and everybody in the building knows the arithmetic.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Raufoss this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad6 Dec 2027
Words at Raufoss training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jacob Blixt Flaten 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.
Squad6 Dec 2027
Gustav Nyheim is the division's best young player this month
At 21 he has spent a month being better than everybody his age in the league, which is a different and harder thing than one good afternoon. Raufoss will try very hard not to make too much of it.
Every squad is half players the manager chose and half players he inherited. Jacob Storevik was chosen, the man who chose him has gone, and he starts again from nothing under the next one.
The board have said in public what they had been saying in private. Results between now and the next meeting decide it, and everybody in the building knows the arithmetic.
Philip Sørlie Bro 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Jacob Dicko Eng was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Every squad is half players the manager chose and half players he inherited. Marcus Melchior was chosen, the man who chose him has gone, and he starts again from nothing under the next one.
“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 The request is on a desk at Åsane, and it is not being withdrawn.
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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 22-year-old it feels ownership of. Emmanuel Mensah has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
“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; Åsane are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Marked 7.84. Ask anyone leaving the ground what settled it and you will get one name, which is the only award that has ever really counted.
Squad18 Oct 2027
10 new faces, and Åsane are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
The run now stands at 5, and the questions being asked around Åsane are no longer polite ones.
Player ratings27 Sep 2027
Up for the corner, and Syver Skeide delivers — 7.80
Centre-halves are allowed forward twice a season and are judged on what they do when they get there. Syver Skeide scored, was marked 7.80, and got back before anybody noticed he had gone.
“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 Åsane, and it is not being withdrawn.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Kristoffer Barmen was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Åsane, and 2 appearances in 6 say he has earned the hearing.
The dugout27 Sep 2027
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 2‑3 defeat, delivered by Magnus Singh to a room that had heard them before.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Åsane have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Player ratings19 Jul 2027
Up for the corner, and Syver Skeide delivers — 5.57
Centre-halves are allowed forward twice a season and are judged on what they do when they get there. Syver Skeide scored, was marked 5.57, and got back before anybody noticed he had gone.
The deal with Raufoss 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.
Herman Geelmuyden 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.
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.
Two goals and a mark of 8.89 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Kristoffer Steinset did not need any: 7.91, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 7.83 at 34, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Adrian Rogulj will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Raufoss the goodbyes have quietly begun.
The rules permit it and it stings anyway. Adrian Rogulj has agreed terms with HamKam for the summer, and until then he pulls on this shirt as a player who has already chosen his next one.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 21-year-old it feels ownership of. Kristoffer Steinset has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
Player ratings12 Jul 2027
Camil Jebara was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.31. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
72 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Raufoss lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Jacob Storevik 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.
5 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Filip Da Silva was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Ruben Svensson is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Martin Singh 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.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Stefan Pedersen 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.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Birger King is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
He is 23 and the ground already sings his name, which is a thing that happens to local boys and almost never to signings. Everything from here is measured against an affection he did nothing to earn except be from here.
Marked 8.21. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Raufoss.
Squad9 Nov 2026
Words at Raufoss training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Sebastian Gjelsvik 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 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.
The dugout9 Nov 2026
The view from the dugout
“We controlled it. There were spells I did not like and we will look at them, but the group showed me something.” Sander Selnaes, on a 3‑0 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Raufoss they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Player ratings21 Sep 2026
Jonas Selnæs, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 7.96
A mark of 7.96 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 21-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
He will play here until the summer and then walk out of the door for free, having already signed elsewhere. Supporters will manage the first part of that sentence; it is the second they will struggle with.
Rafik Zekhnini 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.
200 games in the shirt. Nobody sets out to build a record like that; it happens to a certain kind of player at a certain kind of club, and this town knows what it has.
The team sheet says it in public every week until it changes. The only version of being dropped a footballer cannot argue with, and the one he takes hardest.
“A point is a point and I will take it, but we should have had all three.” Sander Selnaes after the 1‑1 draw, and the sentence every manager in the country said at some stage this weekend.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Alexander Achinioti-Jönsson trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.