A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. ES Mostaganem will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about 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 ES Mostaganem this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. CS Constantine have kept their man, and ES Mostaganem go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Djamel Benlamri was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout18 Jan 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 Nassim Djabou left the room before anybody could ask which.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. ES Mostaganem will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
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.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 7.82 at 35, and nobody on the pitch was better.
The offer went to CS Constantine this week and it is theirs to answer. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loud the door closes.
Everybody at ES Mostaganem saw it before anybody said it, which is how this always goes. At 35 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.
The run now stands at 16, and the questions being asked around ES Mostaganem are no longer polite ones.
The terraces4 Jan 2027
The mood at ES Mostaganem has turned into something else
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. ES Mostaganem will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Ahmed Aït-Abdesslem 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.
200 games in these colours. Service of that kind gets rarer every season, and the crowd knows it.
Squad4 Jan 2027
Words at ES Mostaganem training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Aqtay Abdallah 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 manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Djamel Benlamri has his answer from ES Mostaganem; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
Half the programme played, position 16, 4 on the board. Doubling it is the sum every supporter has done and the only one nobody at the club will do out loud.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. ES Mostaganem will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Sid Ali Lamri was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout28 Dec 2026
The manager’s verdict
“That is on me. I pick the team and I picked wrong.” Managers say that when they mean it and when they need to be seen to, and after 0‑2 Nassim Djabou left the room before anybody could ask which.
1 error, one goal, and a night in front of the same three seconds. He will see it tonight, tomorrow and probably in February, and everybody who has played knows exactly which frame he keeps stopping on.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 43 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at ES Mostaganem this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Successful dribbles: 18. 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.
Squad21 Dec 2026
Sid Ali Lamri falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Louis Bonnieu and ES Mostaganem agree another 3 years.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 51 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
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.
It has stopped being a mood in the stands and started being something organised. Boards can ignore a bad atmosphere for a long time; they cannot ignore this stage of it for very long at all.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason ES Mostaganem will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
0‑2 to MC Alger, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
Squad7 Dec 2026
Words at ES Mostaganem training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Sid Ali Lamri 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.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Mohamed Naâmani and ES Mostaganem agree another 1 years.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason ES Mostaganem will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” ES Mostaganem have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Ahmed Aït-Abdesslem 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.
Squad30 Nov 2026
Sid Ali Lamri falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Goalkeepers do not get to make mistakes; they get to make goals. He made one, he knew it instantly, and there was nobody behind him to make it anything else.
The dugout30 Nov 2026
The manager’s verdict
“That is on me. I pick the team and I picked wrong.” Managers say that when they mean it and when they need to be seen to, and after 0‑3 Nassim Djabou left the room before anybody could ask which.
In brief
The dugoutDaouda Koné is still being punished for one mistake
The words a physio says slowly. 20 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.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” ES Mostaganem 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 ES Mostaganem this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation ES Mostaganem are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.
The dugout23 Nov 2026
The manager’s verdict
“I am frustrated, honestly. We did enough to win and we did not win.” Nassim Djabou was not hiding it after 2‑2, and nobody in the ES Mostaganem dressing room was either.
27 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. ES Mostaganem lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Sid Ali Lamri was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Abdellah El Moudène’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and ES Mostaganem needing him to play as if none of it matters.
9 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at ES Mostaganem this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
200 games in these colours. Service of that kind gets rarer every season, and the crowd knows it.
Squad9 Nov 2026
Words at ES Mostaganem training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Djamel Benlamri 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.
8 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 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 0‑1 defeat, delivered by Nassim Djabou to a room that had heard them before.
1 error, one goal, and a night in front of the same three seconds. He will see it tonight, tomorrow and probably in February, and everybody who has played knows exactly which frame he keeps stopping on.
Clubs make promises constantly and the page usually only hears about them when they are broken. This one was honoured, and the dressing room noticed that faster than any supporter did.
In brief
The dugoutThe manager has not finished forgetting Mehdi Zeffane's mistake
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.
Oussama Benhaoua was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Successful dribbles: 17. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
The dugout2 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 1‑2 defeat, delivered by Nassim Djabou to a room that had heard them before.
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.
The captaincy has been taken off Ahmed Aït-Abdesslem. ES Mostaganem will call it a decision about the team; a dressing room reads it as a verdict on a man.
In brief
SquadMohamed Medjaji falls out with a teammate over standards
0‑3 to ES Ben Aknoun, and it was every bit as bad as the number suggests. There are defeats you argue about and defeats you apologise for; this was the second kind.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at ES Mostaganem this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
Squad26 Oct 2026
Words at ES Mostaganem training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Sid Ali Lamri 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 system has changed and his position has not. A footballer can improve his form; he cannot improve the manager’s formation, and that is the whole of the problem.
The music was off and the showers ran late. What was said in that dressing room stays there, but Saturday will publish the minutes.
The dugout26 Oct 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 0‑3 defeat, delivered by Nassim Djabou to a room that had heard them before.
Somebody else has been better, the manager has said so with a team sheet, and there is no argument to be had. He will get the shirt back the only way it can be got back.
CS Constantine go through and ES Mostaganem go home, 0‑2 the scoreline that did it. The dressing room will call the league the priority now, because that is what dressing rooms say.
Every footballer has an answer to the question about his boyhood club, and most of them never get to act on it. Arthylio Nadé has, at ES Mostaganem, and the first month will show what that does to a man.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Sid Ali Lamri was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Ahmed Aït-Abdesslem 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.
11 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.
Every shape has positions in it and this one does not have his. ES Mostaganem will either change the shape, change his job, or change his club, and he is waiting to hear which.
2 in front and in complete control, and it finished with JS Kabylie the happier side. There is no version of this afternoon that ES Mostaganem will enjoy reviewing.
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.
Ahmed Aït-Abdesslem 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Sid Ali Lamri was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Mohamed Naâmani and ES Mostaganem agree another 1 years.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at ES Mostaganem this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
6 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about ES Mostaganem and CR Belouizdad in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 1‑5, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Chouaib Boulkaboul was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
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.
Ali Haroun 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Mohamed Medjaji was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
There is no complaint available here and everybody involved knows it, which does not make the walk to the bench any shorter. Form is the only currency in football that cannot be borrowed against.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Abdel Ali Hamadi’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and ES Mostaganem needing him to play as if none of it matters.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Mounir Aziria trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
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.
ASO Chlef held the lead for 4 minutes, which is not long enough to enjoy it. ES Mostaganem answered before the celebration had properly finished, and the shape of the afternoon changed with it.
Oussama Benhaoua 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Djamel Benlamri was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
10 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.
Successful dribbles: 14. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
The dugout14 Sep 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.” Nassim Djabou chose the glass-half-full version of 1‑1; the supporters left with the other one.
That is the business done at ES Mostaganem 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.
Ahmed Aït-Abdesslem 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.
Senior shirt numbers handed to boys the coaches have known since they were twelve. Most will not make it and all of them have already done the hard part.
ES Mostaganem asked and Police Union said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Hillal Halliche 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 oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
The manager has re-ordered his thinking and Abdenacer Bensaci 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.
The plan went upstairs and came back down. Nothing about that will make a headline anywhere else, and everybody who works at the training ground will remember it for years.
The system has changed and his position has not. A footballer can improve his form; he cannot improve the manager’s formation, and that is the whole of the problem.
The deal with ES Setif 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.
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at El Masry is saying, and nobody at ES Mostaganem is enjoying the guessing.
ES Mostaganem asked and Real Bamako said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
A loan enquiry to CS Constantine: cover, or a look at somebody the club cannot afford to buy yet. Either way the answer will come back inside the week.
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.
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation ES Mostaganem are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.
The deal with El Masry 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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. MC El Bayadh have kept their man, and ES Mostaganem go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
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.
Wa All Stars 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.
USM Alger arrived with $260.0K 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.
Taher Ben Khelifa has gone, the accounts have $260.0K 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.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. ES Mostaganem have done the hard part with MB Rouissat, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
ES Mostaganem asked and Olympique Akbou said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Ahmed Aït-Abdesslem 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.
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.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Nobody sells a season ticket on a signing like this. Every manager who has been through a bad October wants one anyway, and ES Mostaganem have gone and got theirs early.
Every footballer has an answer to the question about his boyhood club, and most of them never get to act on it. Abdel Ali Hamadi has, at ES Mostaganem, and the first month will show what that does to a man.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. ES Mostaganem have done the hard part with Real Bamako, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
Ali Haroun and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Ramy Slimani is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Riyad Benaceur 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. Mehdi Belaili 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 name of Mohamed Hacene Bengrina has come up in conversations ES Mostaganem were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
ES Mostaganem asked and Petrojet said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
The injury that keeps coming back, keeps being rushed back from, and quietly costs more careers than the dramatic ones. 15 days is the estimate; the honest figure depends on whether anybody is patient.
Still no offer on the table, and Ali Haroun’s deal keeps shrinking. In boardroom language, silence this long stops being an oversight and starts being an answer.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Djamel Benlamri was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
ES Mostaganem have made the call to Real Bamako. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.