Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Daryll Benlahlou will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Eupen the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Yaimar Medina 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. László Bénes 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.
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.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Daniel Kasper signs something — a contract at Eupen or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
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 words a physio says slowly. 25 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
What was said behind closed doors has now been said in front of a microphone. Everybody at Eupen can do the arithmetic, including the man it is aimed at.
Yaimar Medina and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad2 Apr 2029
Léo Pétrot 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.
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.
Every squad has men who were signed by a particular manager and men who were merely inherited. László Bénes is in the first group, and the man who wanted him here is no longer in the building.
Successful dribbles: 24. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at KV Kortrijk this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Milan Zonneveld was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
17 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 25 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Eupen can pretend not to have heard.
Eupen and KV Kortrijk have settled on $31.0K. The rest belongs to the player and his agent, and a supporter who has watched one of these before knows not to buy the shirt yet.
The deal with Union SG 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.
Eupen offered $80.0K; RAAL La Louviere said it was not close. The manager will be told the money is still there for the right player, which is what managers are told.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Merveille Bokadi was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
21 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. KV Kortrijk lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
“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 KV Kortrijk, and it is not being withdrawn.
Boardroom31 Jul 2028
5 academy players handed senior numbers at KV Kortrijk
The morning the pathway stops being a brochure and becomes a team sheet. Most of them will not be here in three years; all of them have already done the hard part, which was getting to today.
Nothing happens for months and then he simply arrives, at no cost, having signed a pre-contract while still turning out for somebody else. It is the least dramatic way to sign a footballer and frequently the shrewdest.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Genoa have kept their man, and KV Kortrijk go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
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.
Charleroi have accepted the money. What KV Kortrijk do not yet have is the man, and between here and the photograph is a conversation about wages that both sides are dreading.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what KV Kortrijk can pretend not to have heard.
Add another name to the list: Dender have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Babacar Djitté Cissé. The answer from KV Kortrijk has not changed — yet.
Squad5 Jun 2028
Words at KV Kortrijk training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Boris Lambert 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 board’s statement ran to three sentences and one of them mentioned results. Simon Tielemans has managed long enough to translate: win soon, or the next statement is shorter.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Hady Camara was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
A year in and the language has not come, the city has not opened up, and he eats alone more often than anybody at KV Kortrijk would like to admit. It is showing on Saturdays.
Every squad is half players the manager chose and half players he inherited. Alan Morales was chosen, the man who chose him has gone, and he starts again from nothing under the next one.
A bad atmosphere can be waited out. A group of people meeting afterwards to decide what to do about it cannot, and everybody in the building knows which stage this is.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what KV Kortrijk can pretend not to have heard.
Dennis Geiger and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad1 May 2028
Words at KV Kortrijk training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Boris Lambert 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.
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at KV Kortrijk can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
The dugout1 May 2028
Marko Ilić is still being punished for one mistake
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.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” KV Kortrijk have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Dennis Geiger 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Hady Camara was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
A conversation in the manager’s office, and a commitment that came out of it. Promises like that are cheap to make and expensive to break, and Jo Coppens has written the date down.
3 months left, and both sides know what that means: every week without a signature, the fee KV Kortrijk could ask drops and the wages Rob Schoofs can ask rise.
A manager forgives a bad Saturday far more readily than a bad Tuesday, because one of them he can explain and the other one he chose. The reports this week have not been good.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Sint-Truiden can pretend not to have heard.
Sint-Truiden had done everything except persuade the man himself. He stays at Valerenga, and the manager goes back to the drawing board with the money still in the bank.
4 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Adrien Thomasson was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Sint-Truiden asked and PSV said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
KV Kortrijk paid $11.0K and Sint-Truiden took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
“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 KV Kortrijk, and it is not being withdrawn.
There comes a point where a club either backs its own ambition or admits it does not have any. KV Kortrijk have paid $4.1M for Adnane Abid, which is the loudest way there is of saying which one it chose.
KV Kortrijk have gone to Club Brugge with a bid, and the supporters have gone to the internet with an opinion about it. Whether either changes anything is up to the selling club.
The number the board signed off was not enough. It has been asked again and raised its own offer to $840.0K — a club that wants Wisdom Mike enough to be asked twice.
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: Sint-Truiden keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
$780.0K was the most the club would pay and Charleroi 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.
Boardroom26 Jul 2027
5 academy players handed senior numbers at KV Kortrijk
The morning the pathway stops being a brochure and becomes a team sheet. Most of them will not be here in three years; all of them have already done the hard part, which was getting to today.
Adnane Abid was the name on every phone-in, and the club has gone and signed him for $4.1M. For one week the board can do no wrong, which is a week most boards never get.
In brief
SquadWords at KV Kortrijk training over how hard people work
$1.7M settles it between the clubs for Halil Özdemir
KV Mechelen have accepted the money. What Sint-Truiden do not yet have is the man, and between here and the photograph is a conversation about wages that both sides are dreading.
“I listened, I thought about it, and I am staying. That is the whole story.” The clubs had agreed a fee. Jo Coppens had not agreed to go, which turned out to be the part that mattered.
$500.0K was the most the club would pay and RWDM 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.
Andrés Ferrari 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 name of Alouis Diriken has come up in conversations Sint-Truiden were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
6 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.
Squad26 Jul 2027
Words at Sint-Truiden training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Taiga Hata 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.
KV Kortrijk and Standard Liege have settled on $4.1M. The rest belongs to the player and his agent, and a supporter who has watched one of these before knows not to buy the shirt yet.
$780.0K on the table at Charleroi. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
KV Kortrijk offered $320.0K; Lommel said it was not close. The manager will be told the money is still there for the right player, which is what managers are told.
KV Kortrijk have gone to Sint-Truiden with a bid, and the supporters have gone to the internet with an opinion about it. Whether either changes anything is up to the selling club.
Lokeren-Temse paid $450.0K and KV Kortrijk took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at KV Kortrijk this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Eden Fellaini 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.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Thorgan Vanaken 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. Adnan Fellaini is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
In brief
SquadWords at KV Kortrijk training over how hard people work
Sint-Truiden have gone to RWDM with a bid, and the supporters have gone to the internet with an opinion about it. Whether either changes anything is up to the selling club.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sint-Truiden this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Ilias Sebaoui was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The name of Jo Coppens has come up in conversations Sint-Truiden were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
“I watch every Sint-Truiden game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at RWDM runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
Nobody at Sint-Truiden will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation Sint-Truiden are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.