Marked for Yannick M'Boné
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad13 May 2030
52 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Cotonsport Garoua lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Market13 May 2030
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Cotonsport Garoua can pretend not to have heard.
Market13 May 2030
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Cotonsport Garoua is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad13 May 2030
Devis Epassy 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.
Market13 May 2030
He left as a boy and has come back still knowing where the away end is. Most signings have to be explained to a town; this one needed a photograph and nothing else.
Squad13 May 2030
Gerzino Nyamsi 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.
The dugout13 May 2030
Alain Ipiélé gets it from the manager
“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 dugout13 May 2030
news_b_reunited_with_his_manager
The dugout13 May 2030
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 Stephane Keller is on it.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad13 Aug 2029
A knee injury of the worst kind for Abdouraman Daman
32 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Cotonsport Garoua lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Market13 Aug 2029
Terms done: Kufre Eta is going
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Fauve Azur Elite waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Cotonsport Garoua is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
Market13 Aug 2029
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Michel Babatunde will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Cotonsport Garoua the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Market13 Aug 2029
The offer from Aigle Royal de Moungo for Yannick M'Boné 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.
Squad13 Aug 2029
Anatole Abang 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.
Squad13 Aug 2029
Words at Cotonsport Garoua training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Junior Onana 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.
Squad13 Aug 2029
37 days, the scan says, and scans are kinder than reality. The fixtures in that window have just become somebody else’s job.
The dugout13 Aug 2029
The manager makes an example of Aaron Bibout
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad9 Jul 2029
74 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Cotonsport Garoua lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Market9 Jul 2029
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Cotonsport Garoua people have started saying his name in the past tense.
Market9 Jul 2029
“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 Cotonsport Garoua, and it is not being withdrawn.
Market9 Jul 2029
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Cotonsport Garoua is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Boardroom9 Jul 2029
The rules permit it and it stings anyway. Nicolas Toko-Ekambi has agreed terms with Fauve Azur Elite for the summer, and until then he pulls on this shirt as a player who has already chosen his next one.
Squad9 Jul 2029
21 days, the medical staff say, and medical staff are optimists by profession. The team sheet will look wrong without him.
The dugout9 Jul 2029
news_b_frozen_out_of_the_side
Squad9 Jul 2029
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Collins Fai and Cotonsport Garoua agree another 2 years.