Kewin 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.
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 players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 3‑0, Nasser Al-Sultan could afford to be generous.
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.
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 was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Damac this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Successful dribbles: 20. 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.
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Nabil Alioui, and the manager let it.
The dugout15 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 1‑2 defeat, delivered by Nasser Al-Sultan to a room that had heard them before.
Warm-up bib, ninety minutes of watching, and a handshake at the end that fooled nobody. Big matches tell you who a manager trusts; this one told Abdulaziz Jurmush.
Al-Qadisiyah will keep picking him until June and will get nothing for him after it. Mohammed Al-Nuqaydan has pre-agreed a move to Damac, and the only people who lose in that arrangement are the ones who let the contract run down.
It finished 2‑0, and it was Morlaye Sylla’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Damac.
Player ratings8 Feb 2027
Morlaye Sylla was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.24. 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.
Four weeks in which nobody in the division did his job better. The award goes on a shelf and the player goes back into the side, which is the order Damac prefer.
Abdulaziz Al-Shahrani 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 players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 2‑0, Nasser Al-Sultan could afford to be generous.
3 goals in one game. The first was taken well, the second was taken greedily, and by the third the crowd were simply waiting for him to get the ball.
Boardroom1 Feb 2027
Damac close the window on a squad of their own making
0 in and 3 out, and no more changes for months. The manager has what he has, the supporters have their opinion of it, and the table will have the last word.
4 straight away victories. Sides that win away are usually sides that can defend and can counter, and the table has begun to reflect what those journeys have earned.
2 goals inside twenty minutes with Yakou Meïté in the middle of it, and Ohod unable to get near the ball long enough to change anything. Some matches are won before the first drink.
In brief
Player ratingsMorlaye Sylla was on a different afternoon to everybody else
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Al-Njoom waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Damac is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
Successful dribbles: 27. 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.
“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 Damac, and it is not being withdrawn.
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 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.
4 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.
1 for Riyadh Sharahili, marked 6.25, 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.
Abdulaziz Al-Shahrani 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.
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 9.40, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
Player ratings11 Jan 2027
A brace, and Nabil Alioui takes the afternoon — 8.79
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Nabil Alioui provided it, and the 8.79 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 6 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
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.
Damac asked and Al-Diriyah said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Damac this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Add another name to the list: Al-Batin have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Ahmed Al-Rashidi. The answer from Damac has not changed — yet.
The demotion a club never announces and a dressing room always notices. Mohammad Alsalkhadi is further from the side than he was, and the reason will not be given until he asks.
Al-Diriyah have been asked whether they would lend him. Loans are agreed quickly or not at all, and this one will be one or the other by the weekend.
In brief
The dugoutThe manager’s verdict
SquadThe division's best last weekend was a Damac man
The dugoutAhmed Omar is still paying for one afternoon at Damac
22Edition
The Damac Gazette
28 Dec 2026
From our football correspondentSteady
Player ratings28 Dec 2026
A brace, and Yakou Meïté takes the afternoon — 8.68
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Yakou Meïté provided it, and the 8.68 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Morlaye Sylla 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 Damac and Al-Riyadh in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
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.
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.17, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
The dugout28 Dec 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.” Nasser Al-Sultan kept it short after the 4‑2 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.
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.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Nasser Al-Sultan after 1‑3, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
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.
Every touch is being weighed now, in print and everywhere else. Some players grow into that and some are quietly ruined by it, and nobody knows which in advance.
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Thamer Al-Shahrani has his answer from Damac; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
Nobody at Damac 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.
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.
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.
Half the programme played, position 6, 29 on the board. Doubling it is the sum every supporter has done and the only one nobody at the club will do out loud.
Nobody will confirm this and nothing else explains the last month of selections. A costly error buys a player a period of being second choice that is always longer than the error was.
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 Kewin is on it.
Al-Hazem left with the points after a 0‑1 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
The dugout7 Dec 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 0‑1 defeat, delivered by Nasser Al-Sultan to a room that had heard them before.
A month is long enough that nobody gets in by accident. Saad Haqawi is in the division's best eleven for it, which is a quieter compliment than an award and a more reliable one.
Nothing is announced when this happens and everybody knows. He is a bigger part of the plan at Damac than he was a month ago, and the training ground worked that out before the team sheet said so.
Nobody at Damac 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.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Damac know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Damac this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Successful dribbles: 13. 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.
The dugout30 Nov 2026
Ahmed Omar 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.
In brief
The dugoutNabil Alioui has become a man the manager trusts
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 11 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Al-Saudi Al-Watani will want this one forgotten quickly: 3‑0, every duel lost, and a long ride home. Damac were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.
Sanousi Al-Hawsawi and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Player ratings23 Nov 2026
Yahya Naji was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.24. 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.
A performance of 8.00 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
The dugout23 Nov 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.” Nasser Al-Sultan, on a 3‑0 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.
In brief
The dugoutThe manager has not finished forgetting Mohammad Alsalkhadi's mistake
Nobody makes a documentary about a hamstring and everybody in the game fears one. Damac will be careful with the return date, because the second one is always worse than the first.
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.
“I respect the manager and I am not going to sit here and pretend I am happy.” It is the most common sentence in football and it has never once been the end of a story.
He asked about his future and was given an answer with minutes in it. The manager has now made a promise in a building where promises are remembered, and the clock on it has started.
Position 3 and 25 points on the board. Nobody at the ground will say the word out loud yet, and everybody at the ground is thinking it.
Player ratings9 Nov 2026
Saad Haqawi, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 7.96
A mark of 7.96 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 21-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Morlaye Sylla 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.
He is 21 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 8.45 — 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.
1 for Riyadh Sharahili, marked 7.79, 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.
5 straight away victories. Sides that win away are usually sides that can defend and can counter, and the table has begun to reflect what those journeys have earned.
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.
A month is long enough that nobody gets in by accident. Saad Haqawi is in the division's best eleven for it, which is a quieter compliment than an award and a more reliable one.
“We earned that. I asked them for a reaction and I got one, and now I want the same again on Saturday.” Nasser Al-Sultan on a 3‑1 afternoon that pleased him more than he was prepared to show.
The words a physio says slowly. 19 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.
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.
There was one mistake and it ended in the net. Defenders are judged on the worst thing they did rather than on the eighty-nine minutes either side of it, which is unfair and is also the job.
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.
“There are things I liked and things we will be doing on Tuesday until they are right.” 1‑1, and a manager who had already decided what Tuesday looked like.
The words a physio says slowly. 26 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.
Two goals and a mark of 8.20 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
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.
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.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Riyadh Sharahili. 2‑1 against Al-Shoulla, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
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.
“We earned that. I asked them for a reaction and I got one, and now I want the same again on Saturday.” Nasser Al-Sultan on a 2‑1 afternoon that pleased him more than he was prepared to show.
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Abdulaziz Al-Shahrani has his answer from Damac; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Damac know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
A year in and the language has not come, the city has not opened up, and he eats alone more often than anybody at Damac would like to admit. It is showing on Saturdays.
Nobody at Damac 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.
Numbers do not stay secret in a dressing room and never have. He is not asking for more than he is worth; he is asking why somebody beside him is worth more, and at Damac that is a harder question to answer.
He asked about his future and was given an answer with minutes in it. The manager has now made a promise in a building where promises are remembered, and the clock on it has started.
The list is a quiet document with a loud meaning. Thamer Al-Shahrani may talk to anybody who asks, and everybody at the club understands what that means.
Sanousi Al-Hawsawi 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.
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.
Chances created: 13. Nothing on the scoresheet and everything in the match: the pass before the pass, over and over, until the defence stopped guessing right.
Every shape has positions in it and this one does not have his. Damac will either change the shape, change his job, or change his club, and he is waiting to hear which.
The board have answered with money instead of encouragement, which is the only answer a manager ever wants. Spending it well is now entirely his problem.
The dugout5 Oct 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.” Nasser Al-Sultan, on a 2‑0 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Damac, and both men came out saying it was fine.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Damac this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Successful dribbles: 21. 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.
200 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.
Marked 7.78 on an afternoon he ran from the first whistle to the last. Whatever else went wrong, Damac had the best player on the pitch.
Squad28 Sep 2026
8 new faces, and Damac 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.
“We earned that. I asked them for a reaction and I got one, and now I want the same again on Saturday.” Nasser Al-Sultan on a 1‑0 afternoon that pleased him more than he was prepared to show.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the whole of the defence. 6 saves, several of them the kind nobody expects to see made, and ten outfield players who owe him a drink.
4 matches without defeat, and then Al-Batin. Nobody at the ground pretended it would go on forever; nobody expected it to stop here either.
The dugout21 Sep 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 0‑2 defeat, delivered by Nasser Al-Sultan to a room that had heard them before.
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.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Kewin signs something — a contract at Damac or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Ninety specific minutes wanted a different sort of player, and the manager picked one. He is not out of form and he is not in the side, and both are true.
The board had gone up, the arguing had started, and then the ball was in the net in the 97th minute. Hajer will replay every second of the added time for a week.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Thamer Al-Shahrani 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.
The dugoutThe manager has not finished forgetting Jamal Harkass's mistake
6Edition
The Damac Gazette
7 Sep 2026
From our football correspondentUpbeat
Boardroom7 Sep 2026
Deadline passes with 15 signed and 5 gone
That is the business done at Damac 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.
Al-Fateh paid $750.0K and Damac took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
The demotion a club never announces and a dressing room always notices. Jonathan Okita is further from the side than he was, and the reason will not be given until he asks.
A month is long enough that nobody gets in by accident. Morlaye Sylla is in the division's best eleven for it, which is a quieter compliment than an award and a more reliable one.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Tariq Abdullah’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Damac needing him to play as if none of it matters.
What was a back-page link has become a chant, and the chant is not friendly. Damac would rather it were settled quietly, and it has stopped being quiet.
A strip of cloth that decides nothing on the pitch and tells the dressing room whose opinion counts. The manager has made a statement without making one.
Marked 8.42 — 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.
“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.
Squad31 Aug 2026
8 new faces, and Damac 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.
An error at the back is a moment; an error in goal is a goal. Kewin knows it, the crowd knew it instantly, and there was nobody behind him to make it anything else.
Nobody will confirm this and nothing else explains the last month of selections. A costly error buys a player a period of being second choice that is always longer than the error was.
The dugout31 Aug 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.” Nasser Al-Sultan kept it short after the 4‑1 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.
He wheeled away like a man who had been carrying it for months, because he had. Damac have their signing off the mark and one press-conference question retired.
Abdulaziz Al-Shahrani 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 dugout24 Aug 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.” Nasser Al-Sultan, on a 2‑0 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Al-Fateh have kept their man, and Damac go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Sanousi Al-Hawsawi 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 supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 0‑3, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
It is the quietest way a club tells you what its ambitions are. The money was asked for, the money was refused, and the people who work there every day now know exactly where they stand.
The shape wanted a different profile against this opponent, which is a real football answer and no comfort at all to the man it is about. He did nothing wrong and he did not play.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Abdulaziz Jurmush has just signed for Damac, and for once the answer mattered.
Abdelkader Bedrane 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 academy exists for exactly this morning. Talal Al-Mutairi 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.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Salman Al-Rashid is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation Damac are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.
Morlaye Sylla 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 phone has started ringing about Abdullah Al-Qahtani again, and this time the name on the line is Hajer. Damac are listening politely and promising nothing.
Still no offer on the table, and Morlaye Sylla’s deal keeps shrinking. In boardroom language, silence this long stops being an oversight and starts being an answer.
Squad3 Aug 2026
7 new faces, and Damac 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.