Valentino Lazaro 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.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Al Ain heard it as anything else.
Squad8 Feb 2027
Words at Al Ain training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Matías Palacios 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.
Two or more conceded in each of the last 4 matches. It is not one mistake repeating itself, which would be the easier thing to fix; it is a different one every week.
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 1‑2, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
A brace, and Caio Lucas takes the afternoon — 9.33
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Caio Lucas provided it, and the 9.33 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the whole of the defence. 8 saves, several of them the kind nobody expects to see made, and ten outfield players who owe him a drink.
Al Ain had done everything except persuade the man himself. He stays at Al Ahli, and the manager goes back to the drawing board with the money still in the bank.
The chase for Daniel Pedrozo ended with $1.6M changing hands and Al Wasl out of reasons to say no. The supporters will judge the fee the only way that matters: on Saturdays.
The deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 4 arrived, 2 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed one.
SquadWords at Al Ain training over how hard people work
26Edition
The Al Ain Chronicle
25 Jan 2027
From our football correspondentSteady
Player ratings25 Jan 2027
A brace, and Caio Lucas takes the afternoon — 9.28
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Caio Lucas provided it, and the 9.28 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
The offer went to Al Ahli this week and it is theirs to answer. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loud the door closes.
$2.8M was the most the club would pay and Al Jazira 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.
Centre-halves are allowed forward twice a season and are judged on what they do when they get there. Adis Jašić scored, was marked 7.98, and got back before anybody noticed he had gone.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Al Ahli have kept their man, and Al Ain go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
The offer went to Al Wasl this week and it is theirs to answer. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loud the door closes.
This is not cover and nobody is pretending it is. $590.0K has been paid because Khalfan Rashid is straightforwardly better than what was already here, and the club has decided to stop waiting.
Giorgos Giakoumakis 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.
$1.8M on the table at Al Jazira. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
Al Ain asked and Al Wahda said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
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.
Valentino Lazaro 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.
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.
Squad18 Jan 2027
Words at Al Ain training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Matías Palacios 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 last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Al Ain have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Al Ain and Al Wasl have settled on $110.0K. 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 fee is $460.0K, the contract is signed, and the argument about whether he is worth it can begin. Al Nasr drove a hard bargain; time will say who won it.
Valentino Lazaro 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.
Add another name to the list: Saba have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Baba Bello Ilou. The answer from Al Ain has not changed — yet.
12 goals in 17 games at Al Nasr — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Al Ain updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
$1.2M on the table at Al Wahda. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
The offer went to Al Nasr this week and it is theirs to answer. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loud the door closes.
$69.0K on the table at Al Wasl. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
The phone has started ringing about Marcel Ratnik again, and this time the name on the line is Al Wahda. Al Ain are listening politely and promising nothing.
Squad4 Jan 2027
Words at Al Ain training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Matías Palacios 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 was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Al Ain this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“The easiest signature of my career.” Marcel Ratnik and Al Ain agree another 4 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Squad28 Dec 2026
Words at Al Ain training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Houssine Rahimi 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 club 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 it has been tried.
The door stayed shut a long time after the final whistle. What was said in there is between them; whether it worked is between them and Saturday.
The dugout28 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 Mahmoud Al Hammadi left the room before anybody could ask which.
Corinthians paid $10.9M and Al Ain took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
Soufiane Rahimi has gone, the accounts have $10.9M 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.
Player ratings21 Dec 2026
Gustavo Ulguim, 20, plays like he has been here for years — 7.79
A mark of 7.79 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 20-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 7.94 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Soufiane Rahimi 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.
12 goals in 13 games at Al Nasr — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Al Ain updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
1 for Adis Jašić, marked 7.94, 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.
A 2‑0 win over Emirates Club, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
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.
100 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.
Successful dribbles: 16. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
The dugout7 Dec 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.” Mahmoud Al Hammadi, on a 2‑0 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Al Ain have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Al Ain this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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 8.11 — 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.
Position 8, 20 points, and every result so far reduced to one line. The second half of the season starts with the same squad and a different set of expectations.
Every club 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 it has been tried.
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.
Valentino Lazaro 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.
6 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Al Ain and Al Jazira in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
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.
“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 dugout23 Nov 2026
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 2‑4 defeat, delivered by Mahmoud Al Hammadi to a room that had heard them before.
Valentino Lazaro 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.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Mohamed Hassan is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
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.
9 appearances at Al Nasr and the goals keep coming. Al Ain are watching this more closely than the borrowing club would like.
The dugout16 Nov 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 1‑3 Mahmoud Al Hammadi left the room before anybody could ask which.
3 goals to the good, and then a slow surrender of everything that had been earned. Matías Palacios will not be the one blamed for it, but nobody at Al Ain escapes the conversation that follows a collapse like this.
Two goals and a mark of 8.01 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Matías Palacios trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
“There are things I liked and things we will be doing on Tuesday until they are right.” 3‑3, and a manager who had already decided what Tuesday looked like.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Al Ain 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 Matías Palacios was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Marked 8.54 — 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.
Marked 8.18 — 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.
Every club 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 it has been tried.
Valentino Lazaro 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 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.
Chances created: 12. Not on the scoresheet and not remotely anonymous — a passing performance that pulled a defence apart without leaving a mark on the column that gets read.
Valentino Lazaro 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.
7 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.
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 0‑1, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
The ambition story running backwards, and the one nobody tells: a footballer who wants a smaller ground, fewer cameras and a crowd that does not turn. It is not weakness and it is rarely reported as anything else.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 23 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
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.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Fahad Omar is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Ibrahim Al Hashmi 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 dugout12 Oct 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 1‑2 Mahmoud Al Hammadi left the room before anybody could ask which.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Soufiane Rahimi provided it, and the 8.99 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Al Ain this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
At 20 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.
7 goals in one match, Soufiane Rahimi on the scoresheet, and a scoreline that will look like a misprint. Neutrals could not have asked more of Al Ain and Al Ahli.
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.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Words at Al Ain training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Houssine Rahimi 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 first defeat in 4 matches. The manager will say it had to come; the dressing room will say it did not have to come against Al Ahli; the supporters will say both, in that order, all week.
In brief
The dugoutThe manager makes an example of Adis Jašić
4 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.
Valentino Lazaro 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 18 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.
“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.
The dugout28 Sep 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.” Mahmoud Al Hammadi kept it short after the 2‑1 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Al Ain, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Two goals and a mark of 8.71 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Soufiane Rahimi 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.
7 goals in one match, Soufiane Rahimi on the scoresheet, and a scoreline that will look like a misprint. Neutrals could not have asked more of Al Ain and Dibba.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Matías Palacios was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Soufiane Rahimi provided it, and the 9.07 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
The deal that would have taken Soufiane Rahimi to MC Alger has collapsed at the last stage, and he reports back to Al Ain with a summer to forget and a season still to play. Nobody is saying which side walked away.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 23 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
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.
7 new signings in one window. Every one may be an upgrade and the side can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild the verdicts never mention.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and MC Alger waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Al Ain is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
There were 87 minutes on the clock and Emirates Club had all but banked the point. Football rarely reads the room, and Al Ain did not stop to explain themselves.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Amadou Niang did not need any: 7.81, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
The deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 15 arrived, 10 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed 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 Al Ain this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
A deal that was a phone call from completion at lunchtime was dead by midnight. Al Ain will try again when the window opens; Al Shaab may not be selling by then.
Emirates Club paid $850.0K and Al Ain took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 20 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
16 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Al Ain lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
The offer from AGMK for Baba Bello Ilou 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.
Soufiane Rahimi 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.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Hussein Al-Naasan is 19, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Al Ain know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Eid Al-Hammadi trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
25 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Al Ain 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 Al Ain, and it is not being withdrawn.
Soufiane Rahimi 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.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. João Marcos is 21, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Squad24 Aug 2026
Words at Al Ain training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Matías Palacios 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.
32 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Al Ain lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Valentino Lazaro signs something — a contract at Al Ain or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
“I listened, I thought about it, and I am staying. That is the whole story.” The clubs had agreed a fee. Kaku had not agreed to go, which turned out to be the part that mattered.
The offer from Al-Wehda for Houssine Rahimi 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.
Soufiane Rahimi 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.
Add another name to the list: Al Fujairah have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Mohammed Abbas. The answer from Al Ain has not changed — yet.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Fahad Hassan 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.
Squad10 Aug 2026
7 new faces, and Al Ain 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.
Add another name to the list: Esteghlal have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Kaku. The answer from Al Ain has not changed — yet.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Al Ain 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 Soufiane Rahimi was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.