The kind of year that ends with a name being read out in a hall. AFC Leopards had the benefit of it every week and now have the problem of everybody else knowing.
The one award nobody else on the pitch can win goes to Humphrey Katasi, on 5 clean sheets across the season. Keepers wait a career for a season like it.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Peter Maker was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” AFC Leopards have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Squad2 Nov 2026
Words at AFC Leopards training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Kaycie Odhiambo 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.
Boardroom2 Nov 2026
156% of the income goes out in wages at AFC Leopards
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.
AFC Leopards will explain it as a decision about the team, and it may well be one. A dressing room has never once read it that way.
The dugout2 Nov 2026
Tyson Otieno 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.
It is a strip of cloth and it decides nothing on a Saturday. It still tells the dressing room exactly whose opinion the manager values, which is the whole point of it.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at AFC Leopards, another week without a signature from Musa Oundo.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” AFC Leopards have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
3 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
Successful dribbles: 22. 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 AFC Leopards this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Eric Omondi was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.34. 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.
Conceding is one thing; the response is what tells you about a dressing room. Eric Omondi had AFC Leopards level again within 2 minutes, and Nairobi United never got to play with a lead at all.
29 days, the scan says, and scans are kinder than reality. The fixtures in that window have just become somebody else’s job.
The dugout19 Oct 2026
The manager’s verdict
“I am not going to get carried away and I will not let them either. It was a good day. There will be harder ones.” Harun Mainge kept it short after the 2‑1 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at AFC Leopards this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Tusker made AFC Leopards work for it, but the scoreboard read 1‑0 at the end and the table does not ask how.
Player ratings28 Sep 2026
Eric Omondi was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.23. 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.
“We earned that. I asked them for a reaction and I got one, and now I want the same again on Saturday.” Harun Mainge on a 1‑0 afternoon that pleased him more than he was prepared to show.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Levis Esambe was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
He wheeled away like a man who had been carrying it for months, because he had. AFC Leopards have their signing off the mark and one press-conference question retired.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 12 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
In brief
The dugoutThe plan did not have a place for Maxwell Otieno
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Kaycie Odhiambo was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“It is not the end of the world and it is not good enough. Both of those are true.” The manager, after a 0‑0 draw, said the honest thing and then went to say it again inside.
The crowd waited for a goal that never came. Ulinzi Stars defended in numbers and left with what they came for, and the two sides could be playing still without troubling a scorer.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. AFC Leopards know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Nobody at AFC Leopards 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.
Nobody at AFC Leopards is suggesting he is out of form. The manager simply wanted somebody with a different set of qualities for ninety specific minutes, and there is nothing a player can train to fix that.
“I am not asking anybody to be better than they are. I am asking everybody to be as good as they are, every week.” Said out loud, in front of everybody, and the room at AFC Leopards was different afterwards.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at AFC Leopards is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Words at AFC Leopards training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Kaycie Odhiambo 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 players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 1‑0, Harun Mainge could afford to be generous.
Every debut is a small story about the future: Jamal Abubakar, 19 years old, off the academy pitches and into the first team. The parents in the stand will keep the programme.
12 times he got in the way of something. Centre-halves get written about when they make mistakes and ignored when they do not, so an afternoon like this needs saying out loud: he is the reason the scoreline reads as it does.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 12 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
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.
Kaycie Odhiambo 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.
There is a level at which a footballer stops being tested and starts being contained, and he reached it some time ago. AFC Leopards know it, and so does everybody who watches him.
A loan enquiry to Maritzburg United: cover, or a look at somebody the club cannot afford to buy yet. Either way the answer will come back inside the week.
“It is not the end of the world and it is not good enough. Both of those are true.” The manager, after a 0‑0 draw, said the honest thing and then went to say it again inside.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Levis Esambe was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.