The fee was agreed and the flight was looked at — and then the phone stopped ringing. Galactik moved on, Adam Mbaiguedem reports back to Elect Sport, and everybody pretends Monday is just Monday.
Mohamed El Ouardi 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 name of David Diazayisua Mamona has come up in conversations Elect Sport were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
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 Mbogo Acyl is on it.
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Elect Sport people have started saying his name in the past tense.
Nobody at Elect Sport 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.
“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 Elect Sport will have to give him a reason to stay or an exit.
In brief
The dugoutThe manager makes Adoum Fachir a promise
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Elect Sport have lost him in all but the paperwork.
“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 The request is on a desk at Elect Sport, and it is not being withdrawn.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Elect Sport will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Elect Sport have done the hard part with Renaissance, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Elect Sport this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Salim Abubakar trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Frédéric Djoita signs something — a contract at Elect Sport or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Elect Sport will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
“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 Elect Sport, and it is not being withdrawn.
Mohamed El Ouardi 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.
Elect Sport asked and Renaissance said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Elect Sport, another week without a signature from Seydina Keïta.
Nobody at Elect Sport 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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 32 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Elect Sport have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Mohamed El Ouardi 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.
Everybody at Elect Sport saw it before anybody said it, which is how this always goes. At 34 the decline is real and measurable — 3 points — and the only question left is how the club handles somebody it owes a great deal to.
Nobody at Elect Sport 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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 39 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Everybody saw it before anybody said it. At 35 the numbers say 3 points down on what he was, and the question for Elect Sport is how to handle a man they owe a great deal.
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.
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.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Elect Sport will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Elect Sport can pretend not to have heard.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Adam Mbaiguedem will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Elect Sport 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.” Elect Sport 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 Elect Sport this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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 Frédéric Djoita is on it.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Frédéric Djoita trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Frédéric Djoita signs something — a contract at Elect Sport or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Elect Sport will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Mohamed El Ouardi 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.
Wages have outrun income and the accountants have started attending meetings they used to send apologies to. Ambition comes second in a season like this.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Elect Sport, another week without a signature from Seydina Keïta.
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 Salim Abubakar is on it.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Frédéric Djoita trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
52 points, and the rest of the division looking up. Every side that finishes first spends the season pretending it is not thinking about it, and this one has started pretending.
Mohamed El Ouardi 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 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 Mbogo Acyl is on it.
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.
Nobody at Elect Sport 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.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Elect Sport, and both men came out saying it was fine.
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Bilel Hartsaoui has his answer from Elect Sport; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
Two goals and a mark of 8.22 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
“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 Elect Sport, and it is not being withdrawn.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Elect Sport is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Elect Sport 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.
A 2‑0 win over Foullah Edifice, a place in the next round, and the quiet arithmetic every supporter does on the walk home: how many more until a final?
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.06 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Mohamed El Ouardi 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.
17 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere else.
Salim Abubakar 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.
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. 12 actions, 7.20, and a manager who will not be substituting him again in a hurry.
8.05. 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.
The award is a small thing with a heavy meaning: for four weeks nobody in this division did his job better. Elect Sport have the trophy on a shelf and the player in the side.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Elect Sport this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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 injury that keeps coming back, keeps being rushed back from, and quietly costs more careers than the dramatic ones. 14 days is the estimate; the honest figure depends on whether anybody is patient.
Nobody at Elect Sport 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.
CotonTchad next, and one man in the Elect Sport dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought of him.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Elect Sport, and both men came out saying it was fine.
A call-up flatters the player and the club that produced him in the same breath. Elect Sport would like him back in one piece and know they will not be consulted.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Adam Mbaiguedem will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Elect Sport the goodbyes have quietly begun.
A player who expected to start watched it instead. The manager will call it a decision for the team; Ferdinand Gassina will call it something else in private.
Successful dribbles: 14. 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.
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 Frédéric Djoita is on it.
16 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
Salim Abubakar 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.
Two sides from the top of the table, one afternoon, and a month of talk decided in ninety minutes. Elect Sport will not use the word title this week and will not stop thinking it.
Player ratings13 Mar 2028
Frédéric Djoita was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.26. 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.
Salim Abubakar 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 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.
A 1‑0 win over AS Etat Major, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
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 Elect Sport prefer.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Elect Sport, another week without a signature from Salim Abubakar.
15 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Elect Sport this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
It happens to all of them and it is still the hardest paragraph a local paper has to write. 34 years old, 3 points down on where he was, and a body that has started charging interest on a career.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Adam Mbaiguedem will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Elect Sport the goodbyes have quietly begun.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Elect Sport 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.
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 Frédéric Djoita is on it.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Abdoulaye Moustapha’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Elect Sport needing him to play as if none of it matters.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Elect Sport, and both men came out saying it was fine.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Salim Abubakar signs something — a contract at Elect Sport or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
14 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere else.
Mohamed El Ouardi 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.
Squad14 Feb 2028
Words at Elect Sport training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Salim Abubakar 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 clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Elect Sport people have started saying his name in the past tense.
6 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.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 7.84 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Boardroom7 Feb 2028
Elect Sport close the window on a squad of their own making
1 in and 1 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.
Salim Abubakar 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 hardest thing about being 19 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. David Diazayisua Mamona did not need any: 8.41, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
5 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.
The offer from Foullah Edifice for David Diazayisua Mamona 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.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Elect Sport 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 Elect Sport 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: Frédéric Djoita. 2‑0 against AS PSI, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Player ratings31 Jan 2028
Frédéric Djoita was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.22. 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.
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.
Position 2, 30 points, and the result everyone checks first is now theirs. The word is still not being said around the ground, which is how you know everyone is thinking it.
Two goals and a mark of 9.09 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
The 85th minute, half the ground already edging towards the exits, and David Diazayisua Mamona decided nobody was going anywhere. Stars Jeunes Talents had no time left to answer.
12 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere else.
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.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Osmane Ndiaye is 20, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Marked 7.88. There is a kind of forward whose value only shows up when you count what he was involved in rather than what he finished, and this is the day that argument makes itself.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Elect Sport have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Salim Abubakar 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.
Mbogo Acyl was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.36. 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.
8.02. 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.
18 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Elect Sport lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Two goals and a mark of 9.29 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and AS Algoy waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Elect Sport is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
10 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
Salim Abubakar 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: AS Algoy have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Adam Mbaiguedem. The answer from Elect Sport has not changed — yet.
25 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Elect Sport lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
An individual honour is a strange thing in a team game, and the best of them are never argued with. He has had the sort of year that ends with his name being read out, and Elect Sport have had the benefit of it.
Salim Abubakar 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 Gérard Nodjiram again, and this time the name on the line is AS Algoy. Elect Sport are listening politely and promising nothing.
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Abdoulaye Mbainaissem has his answer from Elect Sport; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
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.
32 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Elect Sport lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Salim Abubakar 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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 19-year-old it feels ownership of. David Diazayisua Mamona 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.
A performance of 8.17 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
The dugout27 Dec 2027
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.” Idriss Mahamat kept it short after the 2‑1 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.
41 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Elect Sport lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
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.
Nobody at Elect Sport 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.
“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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Elect Sport this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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 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.
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.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Abakar Haroun Mahamat provided it, and the 9.01 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Salim Abubakar 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 most common injury in the game and the most rushed back from. Elect Sport will quote 15 days and will be careful with it, because the second one is always worse than the first.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Abakar Haroun Mahamat. 2‑0 against AS Etat Major, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
8 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
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.
The dugout6 Dec 2027
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.” Idriss Mahamat kept it short after the 2‑0 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.
Salim Abubakar 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.
Marked 8.46 — 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.
Successful dribbles: 16. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
The dugout29 Nov 2027
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.” Idriss Mahamat kept it short after the 3‑1 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 Elect Sport, and both men came out saying it was fine.
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.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Elect Sport know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Nobody at Elect Sport 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.
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Gérard Nodjiram has his answer from Elect Sport; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Abdoulaye Moustapha’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Elect Sport needing him to play as if none of it matters.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Elect Sport, and both men came out saying it was fine.
They sit in position 13 and they will be waiting. Away form is where a season shows its true character, and this side has a point to make about its own.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Elect Sport this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Something was said to Goukouni Abakar and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
Nobody at Elect Sport 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.
6 months left, and both sides know what that means: every week without a signature, the fee Elect Sport could ask drops and the wages Seydina Keïta can ask rise.
A year in and the city has not opened up, the language has not come, and lunch is eaten alone more often than anybody at Elect Sport would admit. It shows on Saturdays.
The injury that keeps coming back, keeps being rushed back from, and quietly costs more careers than the dramatic ones. 16 days is the estimate; the honest figure depends on whether anybody is patient.
Salim Abubakar 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.” 0‑1, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
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 call-ups is a compliment to the squad and a headache for the man running it. He will get them back in a fortnight, tired, in various states of repair.
A month is long enough that nobody gets in by accident. Adoum Defallah is in the division's best eleven for it, which is a quieter compliment than an award and a more reliable one.
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 Mohamed El Ouardi is on it.
At 19 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.
Salim Abubakar 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 run ends on an afternoon somebody had marked down as routine. This one went 4 matches, which is long enough that a town had stopped counting, and short enough that it will remember exactly who stopped it.
“We are a long way apart, and pretending otherwise helps nobody.” Neither side is close, and the calendar is not on the club's side.
The dugout1 Nov 2027
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 0‑2 Idriss Mahamat left the room before anybody could ask which.
It will be explained as a change for the team and it may even be one. Nobody who has worn one believes that, and neither does the man who has just had it taken away.
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 Elect Sport.
The dugout25 Oct 2027
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.” Idriss Mahamat kept it short after the 2‑0 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.
Nobody at Elect Sport 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.
9 attempts, none of them in. He got into the right places all afternoon, which is the hard part, and did the easy part badly — and that is the version of a bad day a manager can live with.
A defender on the scoresheet, which happens rarely enough that everybody in the ground remembers who took the corner. 1 for him, and a mark of 7.72 for the rest of it.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Elect Sport this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Marked 8.05 — 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 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 Abakar Haroun Mahamat is on it.
Salim Abubakar 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 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 Mohamed El Ouardi is on it.
Galactik next, and one man in the Elect Sport dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought of him.
The list is a quiet document with a loud meaning. Abdoulaye Mbainaissem may talk to anybody who asks, and everybody at the club understands what that means.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Elect Sport know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
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 instruction came from the boardroom and the dugout did not agree with it. Somebody will go, the fee will be called good business, and the manager will spend the season rebuilding around the space.
Seydina Keïta 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.
Boardroom4 Oct 2027
1 academy players handed senior numbers at Elect Sport
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.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Abdramane Bechir 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.
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.
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 Salim Abubakar is on it.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Abdoulaye Moustapha trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Elect Sport this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Elect Sport, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Nobody at Elect Sport 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.
Salim Abubakar 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 no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Abdoulaye Ndoram has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Abdoulaye Djimet 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. Abdoulaye Doungous 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 academy exists for exactly this morning. Saleh Abba 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.
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 Abakar Haroun Mahamat is on it.
Position 4, 34 points, and a run-in that decides whether next season has Thursday nights in it. Nobody is calling it a race yet, which is what people say during one.
A new face in his position and a shirt he thought he owned suddenly up for discussion. Elect Sport have promised nothing, which is what clubs promise at this stage.
Elect Sport close the window on a squad of their own making
10 in and 6 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.
Salim Abubakar 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 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.
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 Mohamed El Ouardi is on it.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Elect Sport, and both men came out saying it was fine.
A call-up flatters the player and the club that produced him in the same breath. Elect Sport would like him back in one piece and know they will not be consulted.
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.
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.
The fee is $6.0K, the contract is signed, and the argument about whether he is worth it can begin. CotonTchad drove a hard bargain; time will say who won 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 Elect Sport this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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 had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Elect Sport, and both men came out saying it was fine.
The deal with CotonTchad 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.
Salim Abubakar 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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Renaissance have kept their man, and Elect Sport go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Nobody at Elect Sport 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.
34 points from position 4. The title is somebody else’s business and the drop is somebody else’s problem; what is left is the argument about passports.
Renaissance arrived with $54.0K and left with the best player in the building. The board will call it business; the queue at the ticket office will use other words.
Mahamat Tchari has gone, the accounts have $54.0K 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.
Salim Abubakar 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.
Boubacar Diebaté is 18, and Elect Sport have signed him for the player he will be rather than the one he is. The first team can wait; the point of a deal like this is the years it buys.
Osmane Ndiaye is 19, and Elect Sport have signed him for the player he will be rather than the one he is. The first team can wait; the point of a deal like this is the years it buys.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Boubacar Diebaté and Elect Sport agree another 3 years.
Nobody at Elect Sport 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.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Elect Sport, 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 Elect Sport this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Elect Sport, another week without a signature from Seydina Keïta.
6 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.
Wages have outrun income and the accountants have started attending meetings they used to send apologies to. Ambition comes second in a season like this.
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 Salim Abubakar is on it.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Elect Sport, and both men came out saying it was fine.
The phone has started ringing about Mahamat Tchari again, and this time the name on the line is Renaissance. Elect Sport are listening politely and promising nothing.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Elect Sport this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Nobody at Elect Sport 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.
The shrug has gone, the language is coming, and he now argues in training like somebody who expects to be here next year. Half a signing's value is this and none of it appears on a fee.
Salim Abubakar 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.
Elect Sport asked and Renaissance said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Nobody at Elect Sport 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.
Position 4 on 34 points, and the places that carry a European ticket are close enough to count. Seasons like this are decided by two results in April, and the club knows which two.
The offer from Gazelle for Mahamat Tchari 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.
Salim Abubakar 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 pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Moral Djimhotoum, and the manager let it.
Boardroom12 Jul 2027
99% of the income goes out in wages at Elect Sport
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 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 had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Elect Sport, and both men came out saying it was fine.
The language has come, the shrug has gone, and he argues in training like a man who expects to be here next year. None of it shows up on a fee and all of it shows up on the pitch.
There are footballers who have a good season and footballers a season is remembered for, and the second kind get their names read out in a hall in the summer. Elect Sport will be quietly delighted and privately nervous.
Salim Abubakar and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
The terraces5 Jul 2027
Elect Sport spend $45.0K on the signing the town wanted
It is the rarest sequence in football: supporters ask for something, and the club goes and does it. $45.0K for Adoum Fachir, and for one week nobody is complaining about anything.
22 games, 5 goals, and a squad option that has arrived without a fee attached. The interesting question at Elect Sport now is not whether he plays but who he displaces.
The manager has re-ordered his thinking and Goukouni Abakar has come out of it lower. He will be told it is temporary, and the players who have heard that before will avoid his eye.
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.
None of them will be seen by anybody outside the training ground for three years, most of them will never play a senior match, and one of them might change the club. That is the whole proposition, and it is why academies exist.
Nobody at Elect Sport 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.
This is the season the town will measure the next twenty against. The trophy travels home with the squad, and the route through the streets was agreed days ago.
A 3‑0 win over Stars Jeunes Talents, a place in the next round, and the quiet arithmetic every supporter does on the walk home: how many more until a final?
Two goals and a mark of 8.39 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 7.81 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
$45.0K on the table at Gazelle. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Elect Sport this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Add another name to the list: AS DGSSIE have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Mahamat Tchari. The answer from Elect Sport has not changed — yet.
Mohamed El Ouardi 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.
$45.0K was the most the club would pay and Gazelle 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.
Everybody saw it before anybody said it. At 34 the numbers say 3 points down on what he was, and the question for Elect Sport is how to handle a man they owe a great deal.
Nobody at Elect Sport 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.
Position 4 on 34 points, and the places that carry a European ticket are close enough to count. Seasons like this are decided by two results in April, and the club knows which two.
“I listened, I thought about it, and I am staying. That is the whole story.” The clubs had agreed a fee. Ferdinand Gassina had not agreed to go, which turned out to be the part that mattered.
$45.0K on the table at Gazelle. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
Mohamed El Ouardi 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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Wadi Degla have kept their man, and Elect Sport go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
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.
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 Mohamed El Ouardi is on it.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Abakar Haroun Mahamat trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
The phone has started ringing about Moral Djimhotoum again, and this time the name on the line is CotonTchad. Elect Sport are listening politely and promising nothing.
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 Ousmane Hissein is on it.
In brief
BoardroomOpen for business: Elect Sport enter the window
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Elect Sport this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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 have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Elect Sport can pretend not to have heard.
Salim Abubakar 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 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.
Position 4, 34 points, and a run-in that decides whether next season has Thursday nights in it. Nobody is calling it a race yet, which is what people say during one.
Salim Abubakar 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.
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.
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 had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Elect Sport, and both men came out saying it was fine.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Elect Sport have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Nobody at Elect Sport 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.
CotonTchad will keep picking him until June and will get nothing for him after it. Mahamat Adda has pre-agreed a move to Elect Sport, and the only people who lose in that arrangement are the ones who let the contract run down.
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation Elect Sport are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.
Four or five weekends of consistency, judged against everybody in the division doing his job. Mohamed El Ouardi has come out of that comparison in the side, and Elect Sport have had the benefit of every one of those afternoons.
Nobody at Elect Sport 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.
A new face in his position and a shirt he thought he owned suddenly up for discussion. Elect Sport have promised nothing, which is what clubs promise at this stage.
“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 Elect Sport, and it is not being withdrawn.
Mohamed El Ouardi 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 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 Abakar Haroun Mahamat is on it.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Abakar Haroun Mahamat trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Position 4 on 34 points, and the places that carry a European ticket are close enough to count. Seasons like this are decided by two results in April, and the club knows which two.
Salim Abubakar 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.
Behind, and beaten by any honest reading, until minute 91. US Moursal had the points in their pocket and a corner of the ground still believed, which is generally when it happens.
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.
It needed Abakar Haroun Mahamat to find the net to bring anything home at all: 1‑1 against US Moursal, and half the dressing room will call it a point won.
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 Mohamed El Ouardi is on it.
“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.
Chances created: 10. Nothing on the scoresheet and everything in the match: the pass before the pass, over and over, until the defence stopped guessing right.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Elect Sport this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 18-year-old it feels ownership of. David Diazayisua Mamona 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.
A 2‑2 draw with Gazelle leaves the dressing room somewhere between relief and regret.
The dugout12 Apr 2027
The manager’s verdict
“I am frustrated, honestly. We did enough to win and we did not win.” Idriss Mahamat was not hiding it after 2‑2, and nobody in the Elect Sport dressing room was either.
Nobody at Elect Sport 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.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Salim Abubakar. 2‑1 against CotonTchad, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
5 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.
The dugout5 Apr 2027
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.” Idriss Mahamat kept it short after the 2‑1 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.
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 have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Elect Sport can pretend not to have heard.
Salim Abubakar 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 have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and Elect Sport know it.
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 Abakar Haroun Mahamat is on it.
A conversation in the manager’s office, and a commitment that came out of it. Promises like that are cheap to make and expensive to break, and Abdoulaye Mbainaissem has written the date down.
Position 6 on 29 points, and the places that carry a European ticket are close enough to count. Seasons like this are decided by two results in April, and the club knows which two.
The least glamorous thing a foreign signing ever does and the one that decides most of them. A player who can hear the shout behind him is a different footballer from one who cannot.
Salim Abubakar 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.
Some games turn on a moment; this one turned on a man. 7.69 on the card, and the Elect Sport support went home talking about one name.
The dugout22 Mar 2027
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.” Idriss Mahamat kept it short after the 1‑0 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.
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.
Shots: 6. Goals: none. The chances were there and they were good ones, and they went into the stand, the goalkeeper's arms and the side netting in roughly that order.
“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 Elect Sport, and it is not being withdrawn.
A point taken on 85 minutes is worth exactly one point and considerably more than that to a dressing room. This side does not stop, which is a reputation worth more than the result.
“A point is a point and I will take it, but we should have had all three.” Idriss Mahamat after the 1‑1 draw, and the sentence every manager in the country said at some stage this weekend.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Abakar Haroun Mahamat trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Nobody at Elect Sport 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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Elect Sport can pretend not to have heard.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Elect Sport this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“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.
5 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.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Elect Sport, and both men came out saying it was fine.
In brief
The dugoutFrédéric Djoita has become a man the manager trusts
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Elect Sport can pretend not to have heard.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Ousmane Hissein provided it, and the 8.21 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Salim Abubakar 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.
At 23 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.
A season average of 7.21 with 6 goals behind it. Opponents have started planning around him, which is the sincerest compliment football pays.
The dugout1 Mar 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.” Idriss Mahamat, on a 4‑1 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.
Salim Abubakar 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.
Nobody at Elect Sport 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.
AS Algoy next, and one man in the Elect Sport dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought of him.
3 goals in 6 games at Gazelle — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Elect Sport updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
15 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Elect Sport lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Elect Sport this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Salim Abubakar, 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 0‑2 defeat, delivered by Idriss Mahamat 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.
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.
23 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Elect Sport lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Two goals and a mark of 8.89 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Elect Sport can pretend not to have heard.
6 goals in one match, Abakar Haroun Mahamat on the scoresheet, and a scoreline that will look like a misprint. Neutrals could not have asked more of Elect Sport and AS DGSSIE.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Ousmane Hissein 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.
31 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Elect Sport lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
“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 Elect Sport, and it is not being withdrawn.
Boardroom1 Feb 2027
Deadline passes with 3 signed and 3 gone
That is the business done at Elect Sport 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.
Salim Abubakar 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.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” David Diazayisua Mamona and Elect Sport agree another 3 years.
The dugout1 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 Idriss Mahamat to a room that had heard them before.
David Diazayisua Mamona is 18, and Elect Sport have signed him for the player he will be rather than the one he is. The first team can wait; the point of a deal like this is the years it buys.
Bilel Hartsaoui is 17, and Elect Sport have signed him for the player he will be rather than the one he is. The first team can wait; the point of a deal like this is the years it buys.
39 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Elect Sport lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Mohamed El Ouardi 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.
8.22. 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.
“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.
In brief
Boardroom91% of the income goes out in wages at Elect Sport
The dugoutThe manager has not finished forgetting Ferdinand Gassina's mistake
The words a physio says slowly. 46 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 offer from AS DGSSIE for Mahamat Harouna 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.
At 23 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.
“We earned that. I asked them for a reaction and I got one, and now I want the same again on Saturday.” Idriss Mahamat on a 3‑0 afternoon that pleased him more than he was prepared to show.
Salim Abubakar and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
The terraces11 Jan 2027
Elect Sport spend $44.0K on the signing the town wanted
It is the rarest sequence in football: supporters ask for something, and the club goes and does it. $44.0K for Adam Mbaiguedem, and for one week nobody is complaining about anything.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Ousmane Hissein 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.
“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 Elect Sport, and it is not being withdrawn.
Salim Abubakar 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.
Everybody at Elect Sport saw it before anybody said it, which is how this always goes. At 34 the decline is real and measurable — 3 points — and the only question left is how the club handles somebody it owes a great deal to.
Marked 8.12 — 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.
“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.
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 Frédéric Djoita is on it.
In brief
BoardroomOpen for business: Elect Sport enter the window
Salim Abubakar 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 won it back and then made something of it, which is two jobs and the reason the scoreline looks the way it does. 9 combined actions and a mark of 6.91, and not one of them will make a highlights package.
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.
The dugout28 Dec 2026
The view from the dugout
“We did not lose. Some weeks that is all you get, and I would rather have the point than not.” Idriss Mahamat chose the glass-half-full version of 0‑0; the supporters left with the other one.
Ninety minutes, no goals, and the argument started before the car park emptied: a point gained, or two thrown away against CotonTchad? Both sides of it will still be going on Thursday.
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.
He used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against Gazelle in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Elect Sport this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 16 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
“The players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 1‑0, Idriss Mahamat 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.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Mohamed El Ouardi signs something — a contract at Elect Sport or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Elect Sport this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
0‑2 to Aiglons, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
The dugout14 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 0‑2 defeat, delivered by Idriss Mahamat 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 Salim Abubakar signs something — a contract at Elect Sport 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.
“If we are going to be beaten, let it not be because somebody in here could not be bothered.” He stood up and said it in front of everybody, which is a thing a squad remembers about a man for years.
Two goals and a mark of 8.21 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Mohamed El Ouardi 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 23 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.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Ousmane Hissein. 2‑0 against AS Etat Major, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
“The players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 2‑0, Idriss Mahamat could afford to be generous.
“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 Elect Sport will have to give him a reason to stay or an exit.
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 Frédéric Djoita is on it.
The manager wanted a different profile for this opponent, which is a real football reason and no consolation. He did nothing wrong and he did not play.
Mohamed El Ouardi 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 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.” 1‑2, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
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 Abakar Haroun Mahamat is on it.
Nobody at Elect Sport 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Elect Sport this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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 Mohamed El Ouardi signs something — a contract at Elect Sport or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Nobody at Elect Sport 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.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Salim Abubakar signs something — a contract at Elect Sport or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Salim Abubakar 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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Frédéric Djoita 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.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Oumar Ngaradoumbe is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Marked 8.12 — 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.
Chances created: 12. Somebody has to open a door before anybody can walk through it, and he spent the afternoon opening doors.
The dugout9 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 0‑2 defeat, delivered by Idriss Mahamat to a room that had heard them before.
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Elect Sport may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Boardroom2 Nov 2026
An order from above at Elect Sport: somebody has to go
Balance sheets do not care about form or about who the manager was planning to build around. The board have decided a sale is required, and the only question left is which name ends up carrying it.
Salim Abubakar 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.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Elect Sport, another week without a signature from Salim Abubakar.
Four or five weekends of consistency, judged against everybody in the division doing his job. Mohamed El Ouardi has come out of that comparison in the side, and Elect Sport have had the benefit of every one of those afternoons.
“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 team at the top of the table next, and the honest measure of where this side actually is. Anybody can beat the club below them; the question is what happens against Renaissance.
It needed Mahamat Harouna to find the net to bring anything home at all: 1‑1 against AS PSI, and half the dressing room will call it a point won.
The dugout26 Oct 2026
The view from the dugout
“We did not lose. Some weeks that is all you get, and I would rather have the point than not.” Idriss Mahamat chose the glass-half-full version of 1‑1; the supporters left with the other one.
He wheeled away like a man who had been carrying it for months, because he had. Elect Sport have their signing off the mark and one press-conference question retired.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Mohamed El Ouardi signs something — a contract at Elect Sport or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
“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 Elect Sport was different afterwards.
They sit in position 12 and they will be waiting. Away form is where a season shows its true character, and this side has a point to make about its own.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Elect Sport this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Idriss Mahamat after 1‑2, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
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.
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 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.
Mohamed El Ouardi 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.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Djibrine Oumar is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
A year in and the language has not come, the city has not opened up, and he eats alone more often than anybody at Elect Sport would like to admit. It is showing on Saturdays.
Next up on the road: Galactik, position 12. The supporters who go will talk about it all week and the ones who do not will check their phones at ten to five.
Mohamed El Ouardi 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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Yannick Ndilabaye 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.
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.
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation Elect Sport are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Elect Sport this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Elect Sport know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Through a full week of training without a reaction, and already asking for a place. Elect Sport will be careful with him and he will resent every day of it.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Ezechiel Tokindang is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Abdoulaye Oumar has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
The deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 8 arrived, 1 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed one.
Frédéric Djoeta 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 offer from AS Korofina for Adoum Defallah 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.
Everything agreed with Renaissance, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
$50.0K was the most the club would pay and Foullah Edifice 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.
The number the board signed off was not enough. It has been asked again and raised its own offer to $53.8K — a club that wants Bicto Tyonga enough to be asked twice.
$37.0K on the table at Foullah Edifice. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
Frédéric Djoeta 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.
Elect Sport offered $21.0K; Aigle Royal de Moungo said it was not close. The manager will be told the money is still there for the right player, which is what managers are told.
$20.0K on the table at Aigle Royal de Moungo. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Elect Sport this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Ferdinand Gassina and Elect Sport agree another 2 years.
Frédéric Djoita 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: Galactik have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Goukouni Abakar. The answer from Elect Sport has not changed — yet.