The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
At 21 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.
8.23. 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 clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Ranheim is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Ranheim can pretend not to have heard.
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.
Tage Haukeberg 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.
Squad26 Oct 2026
10 new faces, and Ranheim are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
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.
15 times he got in the way of something. Centre-halves get written about when they make mistakes and ignored when they do not, so an afternoon like this needs saying out loud: he is the reason the scoreline reads as it does.
15 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Ranheim lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Ranheim 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 Ranheim this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad19 Oct 2026
Words at Ranheim training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Martin Ellingsen 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.
“A point is a point and I will take it, but we should have had all three.” Ruben Bjorkan after the 0‑0 draw, and the sentence every manager in the country said at some stage this weekend.
24 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Ranheim lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Clubs 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.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Famara Camara signs something — a contract at Ranheim or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
3 months left, and both sides know what that means: every week without a signature, the fee Ranheim could ask drops and the wages Philip Slørdahl can ask rise.
Philip Slørdahl has done the arithmetic and does not like the answer. Nothing corrodes a squad faster, and no club has ever solved it by explaining the wage structure to a footballer.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Håkon Gangstad trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
The words a physio says slowly. 31 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Ranheim this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
7 goals in one match, Seydina Diop on the scoresheet, and a scoreline that will look like a misprint. Neutrals could not have asked more of Ranheim and Stabaek.
Marked 8.38 — 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.
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 dugout5 Oct 2026
The manager’s verdict
“That is on me. I pick the team and I picked wrong.” Managers say that when they mean it and when they need to be seen to, and after 3‑4 Ruben Bjorkan left the room before anybody could ask which.
In brief
SquadA place in the month's best eleven for Famara Camara
38 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Ranheim lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Ranheim they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
“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 Ranheim, and it is not being withdrawn.
The rules permit it and it stings anyway. Philip Slørdahl has agreed terms with Viking for the summer, and until then he pulls on this shirt as a player who has already chosen his next one.
4 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Martin Ellingsen was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Ranheim this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Ranheim they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
There is no worse way to lose a footballer. Lucas Kolstad has pre-agreed a move away, which means every appearance between now and June is made by a man the club can no longer sell, and somebody upstairs will be asked why the contract was allowed to get here.
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 chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 3 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
At 21 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.
“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.
In brief
The dugoutSomebody else is better right now than Mathias Emilsen
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Ranheim have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Successful dribbles: 24. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Words at Ranheim training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Philip Slørdahl 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.
Mustapha Abu 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 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.” Ruben Bjorkan chose the glass-half-full version of 0‑0; the supporters left with the other one.
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.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Mustapha Abu’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Ranheim needing him to play as if none of it matters.
Words at Ranheim training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Martin Ellingsen 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 demotion a club never announces and a dressing room always notices. Andreas Fossli is further from the side than he was, and the reason will not be given until he asks.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Ranheim, another week without a signature from Philip Slørdahl.
Kongsvinger next, and one man in the Ranheim dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought of him.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Ranheim know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Famara Camara was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Ranheim asked and KFUM Oslo said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
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.
The dugout31 Aug 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 Ruben Bjorkan to a room that had heard them before.
“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 Ranheim, and it is not being withdrawn.
Player ratings24 Aug 2026
Famara Camara, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 8.44
A mark of 8.44 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 21-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Famara Camara 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.
Ranheim asked and Haugesund said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 21-year-old it feels ownership of. Famara Camara 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Philip Slørdahl was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Marked 8.12. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Ranheim.
The dugout24 Aug 2026
The manager’s verdict
“I am not going to get carried away and I will not let them either. It was a good day. There will be harder ones.” Ruben Bjorkan kept it short after the 2‑0 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.
In brief
Player ratingsSeydina Diop beats them one at a time
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.00 at 35, and nobody on the pitch was better.
The deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 12 arrived, 20 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed one.
The offer from Kongsvinger for Elias Sandøy Myrvågnes 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.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Ranheim have done the hard part with Egersund, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
Ranheim asked and Kristiansund said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Squad17 Aug 2026
Famara Camara 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.
Christoffer Aasbak 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.
Famara Camara 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 Elias Sandøy Myrvågnes again, and this time the name on the line is Kongsvinger. Ranheim are listening politely and promising nothing.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Lars King 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.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Sander Normann 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.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Marcus Selnaes 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.
Squad10 Aug 2026
Words at Ranheim training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Christoffer Aasbak is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Every shape has positions in it and this one does not have his. Ranheim will either change the shape, change his job, or change his club, and he is waiting to hear which.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Seydina Diop did not need any: 8.31, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Ranheim can pretend not to have heard.
Morten Konradsen 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.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Words at Ranheim training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Famara Camara 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.
At 20 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.