Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Moustapha Mbow will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Paris FC the goodbyes have quietly begun.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Paris FC have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Ilan Kebbal 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.
It is not a grievance and it is not a demand: he wants to play continental football, and he has stopped hiding it. Whether Paris FC can give him that is a question about the club, not about him.
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.
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.
“A point is a point and I will take it, but we should have had all three.” Stéphane Lacroix after the 0‑0 draw, and the sentence every manager in the country said at some stage this weekend.
3 wins on the spin now, and the question has changed from whether the run ends to who ends it. Confidence like this cannot be bought; it has to be earned exactly this way.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Paris FC this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad11 Oct 2027
Moses Simon 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.
Marked 8.27. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Paris FC.
The dugout11 Oct 2027
The manager has not finished forgetting Maxime Lopez'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.
The dugout11 Oct 2027
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.” Stéphane Lacroix, on a 1‑0 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.
The one version of being left out a player cannot argue with, and the one he takes worst. Somebody else has been better and the team sheet says so, in public, every week until it changes.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Diego Coppola signs something — a contract at Paris FC or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Paris FC hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Moses Simon was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Ilan Kebbal. 2‑1 against Angers SCO, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
He is 22 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.
Ilan Kebbal 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 Johannes Eggestein was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Luca Koleosho 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.
Marked 8.34 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.29, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
Player ratings27 Sep 2027
Moses Simon was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.09. 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.
9 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.
14 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Paris FC lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Luca Koleosho is 23, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Paris FC this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Successful dribbles: 22. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
Squad13 Sep 2027
Moses Simon 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 Sep 2027
The manager has not finished forgetting Maxime Lopez'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.
“A point is a point and I will take it, but we should have had all three.” Stéphane Lacroix after the 0‑0 draw, and the sentence every manager in the country said at some stage this weekend.
At 21 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.
Diego Coppola and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad16 Aug 2027
Words at Paris FC training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Johannes Eggestein 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.
Rémy Riou has left for AJ Auxerre in a $130.0K deal. The accountants are pleased; the supporters are less certain.
Squad16 Aug 2027
Moustapha Mbow has improved at 27, which nobody expected
Careers are supposed to plateau and then decline, and the players who ignore that are always the ones who were listening on the training ground. 3 points of it, over months, at an age where the direction normally only goes one way.
The unglamorous genius of a well-written contract. Tuomas Ollila is somebody else's player now, and $766.7K has arrived because the people who sold him thought further ahead than the transfer window.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Diego Coppola signs something — a contract at Paris FC or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
He used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against Olympique de Marseille in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Paris FC, another week without a signature from Daniel Arnaud.
21 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Paris FC lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Paris FC people have started saying his name in the past tense.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Diego Coppola is 23, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Bourg-Peronnas paid $300.0K and Paris FC took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
Squad9 Aug 2027
Moses Simon 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.
Daniel Arnaud is 34 and has run out of things to prove. What he has left is where to stand, when to slow it down and what to say at half-time, and none of that is on a fitness chart.
The words a physio says slowly. 66 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.
“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 Paris FC, and it is not being withdrawn.
The deal with Red Star 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.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Diego Coppola is 23, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Nimes have kept their man, and Paris FC go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Luca Koleosho 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.
At 27 the improving is meant to be over. It is not: 3 points better than the mark taken at the start of the year, which is the sort of thing that happens to players who take the boring parts of the job seriously.
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Paris FC has been clear about where Pierre-Yves Hamel stands, which is more than many ever get.
114 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Paris FC lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a 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 Paris FC, and it is not being withdrawn.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Paris FC have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Jean-Philippe Krasso was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Mathieu Deplagne trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
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 Jean-Philippe Krasso is on it.
63 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Paris FC lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Paris FC can pretend not to have heard.
Diego Coppola and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad19 Apr 2027
Words at Paris FC training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Luca Koleosho 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 had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Paris FC, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Paris FC know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
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 Jean-Philippe Krasso is on it.
“I did not come here to warm up in front of people.” He is out of contract eventually, he is old enough to count the weeks, and Paris FC will have to give him a reason to stay or an exit.
The words a physio says slowly. 72 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.
The last league game has been played and the table has stopped moving: 47 points. The summer begins on Monday, and so does the argument about what it all meant.
1 for Maxime Lopez, marked 7.78, and a centre-half's name in the part of the report he normally only reaches by mistake. He will not be allowed to forget it in the dressing room for a month.
Diego Coppola 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.
Squad12 Apr 2027
Luca Koleosho 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.
It needed Maxime Lopez to find the net to bring anything home at all: 1‑1 against Paris Saint-Germain, and half the dressing room will call it a point won.
The one version of being left out a player cannot argue with, and the one he takes worst. Somebody else has been better and the team sheet says so, in public, every week until it changes.
“It is not the end of the world and it is not good enough. Both of those are true.” The manager, after a 1‑1 draw, said the honest thing and then went to say it again inside.
“I listened, I thought about it, and I am staying. That is the whole story.” The clubs had agreed a fee. Timothée Kolodziejczak had not agreed to go, which turned out to be the part that mattered.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Paris FC can pretend not to have heard.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Paris FC heard it as anything else.
Ilan Kebbal 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.
RC Lens left with the points after a 0‑1 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Squad8 Feb 2027
Words at Paris FC training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Luca Koleosho 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 pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Jonathan Ikoné, and the manager let it.
The dugout8 Feb 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 0‑1 defeat, delivered by Stéphane Lacroix to a room that had heard them before.
Two goals and a mark of 8.51 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Boardroom1 Feb 2027
Deadline passes with 0 signed and 0 gone
That is the business done at Paris FC until the window opens again. Whether it was enough will be answered on Saturdays rather than in a column, and the first Saturday is close.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
14 shut-outs and counting. Goalkeepers are only noticed when they fail, and Kevin Trapp has given nobody the chance.
Squad1 Feb 2027
Luca Koleosho 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.
Marked 8.44 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
“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 Paris FC, and it is not being withdrawn.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Paris FC this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
He won it back and then made something of it, which is two jobs and the reason the scoreline looks the way it does. 11 combined actions and a mark of 7.11, and not one of them will make a highlights package.
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.45, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
Squad4 Jan 2027
Luca Koleosho 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.
It is not a grievance and it is not a demand: he wants to play continental football, and he has stopped hiding it. Whether Paris FC can give him that is a question about the club, not about him.
Otávio 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.
3 games without scoring. Strikers stop looking up, midfielders take the extra touch, and every shot that clears the bar is followed by a groan that has been building since the last goal.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Luca Koleosho was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
27 points at the turn. The first half of a season is a promise; the second is a bill, and the town is about to find out which of the two this one was.
The dugout14 Dec 2026
The manager’s verdict
“That is on me. I pick the team and I picked wrong.” Managers say that when they mean it and when they need to be seen to, and after 0‑1 Stéphane Lacroix left the room before anybody could ask which.
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.
Diego Coppola 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.
Squad16 Nov 2026
Rudy Matondo 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.
“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 Paris FC will have to answer with minutes or with a transfer.
“There are things I liked and things we will be doing on Tuesday until they are right.” 0‑0, and a manager who had already decided what Tuesday looked like.
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.
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Paris FC hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Paris FC this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
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.
7.77, 1 on the scoresheet, and the specific comedy of a back-four player celebrating like somebody who does this every week. He does not, and that is exactly why the ground reacted the way it did.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Paris FC this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Words at Paris FC training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Luca Koleosho 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 shape has positions in it and this one does not have his. Paris FC will either change the shape, change his job, or change his club, and he is waiting to hear which.
RC Lens paid $20.3M and Paris FC took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
Paris FC have gone to Toulouse FC 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.
Paris FC asked and Toulouse FC said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Samir Chergui has gone, the accounts have $20.3M in them, and the supporters have the feeling of having been sold something themselves. Good business and a good decision are not always the same thing.
“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 Paris FC, and it is not being withdrawn.
Ilan Kebbal 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.
Marked 7.39 on 14 actions at both ends of the pitch. Midfielders like this get described as unspectacular by people who have never tried to play against one.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Paris FC this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Boardroom17 Aug 2026
5 academy players handed senior numbers at Paris FC
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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Chamois Niortais have kept their man, and Paris FC go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Stéphane Bonnet is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Paris FC hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Diego Coppola and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Words at Paris FC training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jonathan Ikoné 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.
24 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.
In brief
Transfer targetsA loan move for Matías Arezo is in the works
The dugoutMoses Simon knocks on the manager’s door