72 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Al-Nahda lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 9 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
The run now stands at 6, and the questions being asked around Al-Nahda are no longer polite ones.
Squad2 Nov 2026
Words at Al-Nahda training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jaime Romero 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 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.
79 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Al-Nahda 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 The request is on a desk at Al-Nahda, and it is not being withdrawn.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 7.93 at 35, and nobody on the pitch was better.
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-Nahda this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
86 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Al-Nahda 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 The request is on a desk at Al-Nahda, and it is not being withdrawn.
Jaime Romero 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.
93 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Al-Nahda lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
0‑5 to Al-Fayha, and it was every bit as bad as the number suggests. There are defeats you argue about and defeats you apologise for; this was the second kind.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 7 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
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-Nahda this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad12 Oct 2026
Jaime Romero 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.
100 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Al-Nahda lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Jaime Romero 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 figure at which a wage bill stops being ambitious and becomes the reason nothing else is possible, and this club has reached it. Nothing is left over for a transfer, a stand or a rainy afternoon.
A midfielder is measured on whether the team functions when he is on the pitch, which is nearly impossible to see and completely obvious in retrospect. 9 actions, 6.89, and a manager who will not be substituting him again in a hurry.
It needed Jaime Romero to find the net to bring anything home at all: 1‑1 against Al-Saudi Al-Watani, and half the dressing room will call it a point won.
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.
Tsubasa Nishi 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.
Successful dribbles: 20. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad28 Sep 2026
Words at Al-Nahda training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Arya Delavari 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.
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 8.99, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
Squad21 Sep 2026
Words at Al-Nahda training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jaime Romero 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-Nahda this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 8 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
It finished 0-3. A cup exit is a disappointment; this was a public dismantling, and the difference between the two is the number of people who will still be talking about it in August.
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-Nahda this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The music was off and the showers ran late. What was said in that dressing room stays there, but Saturday will publish the minutes.
Squad14 Sep 2026
15 new faces, and Al-Nahda 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.
The words a physio says slowly. 18 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.
At 35 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.11 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Jaime Romero 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.
Squad7 Sep 2026
Arya Delavari 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 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.
Player ratings31 Aug 2026
A brace, and Lars Veldwijk takes the afternoon — 9.37
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Lars Veldwijk provided it, and the 9.37 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
At 36 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 7.82 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
“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-Nahda, 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 Al-Nahda this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Lars Veldwijk. 3‑2 against Ohod, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Squad31 Aug 2026
Jaime Romero 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.
At 22 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
Jaime Romero 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 particular warmth a ground reserves for a 22-year-old it feels ownership of. Marlon Flórez 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.
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Al-Nahda has been clear about where Mohammed Al-Harbi stands, which is more than many ever get.
Nobody sells a season ticket on a signing like this. Every manager who has been through a bad October wants one anyway, and Al-Nahda have gone and got theirs early.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.15 at 35, and nobody on the pitch was better.
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-Nahda this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad17 Aug 2026
Words at Al-Nahda training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Arya Delavari 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.
He is doing things on a Saturday afternoon that nobody around him can answer, which is flattering for about one season and a problem after that. Al-Nahda will not keep him by pretending otherwise.
10 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.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Marlon Flórez has just signed for Al-Nahda, and for once the answer mattered.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Abdullah Al-Dossari and Al-Nahda agree another 3 years.
Tsubasa Nishi 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.
Squad10 Aug 2026
Jaime Romero 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 was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Al-Nahda this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Al-Nahda has been clear about where Ali Al-Eid stands, which is more than many ever get.