The words a physio says slowly. 22 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.
He won it back and then made something of it, which is two jobs and the reason the scoreline looks the way it does. 17 combined actions and a mark of 6.72, and not one of them will make a highlights package.
Nabil Jaadi 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 watch every Seraing game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Lierse runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
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.
29 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Seraing lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Alexandro Calut 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 Nabil Jaadi was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
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.
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Seraing told Alexandro Calut something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
Some games turn on a moment; this one turned on a man. 7.58 on the card, and the Seraing support went home talking about one name.
The dugout26 Oct 2026
Somebody else is better right now than Nabil Jaadi
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.
In brief
The dugoutThe manager’s verdict
Player ratingsAbdoulaye Bâ beats them one at a time
36 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Seraing lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Seraing this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Youssef Mokhtari is 22, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
He is 22 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.
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.
43 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Seraing lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
At 22 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.
Nabil Jaadi 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.
7 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 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.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Maxime Mejjati-Alami’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Seraing 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 Noah Solheid trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
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 Malek Adrar has written the date down.
7 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Nabil Jaadi was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
At 22 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
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.
Marked 6.58 on 9 actions at both ends of the pitch. Midfielders like this get described as unspectacular by people who have never tried to play against one.
6 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.
Player ratings28 Sep 2026
Up for the corner, and Jérémy Landu delivers — 7.41
Centre-halves are allowed forward twice a season and are judged on what they do when they get there. Jérémy Landu scored, was marked 7.41, and got back before anybody noticed he had gone.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Seraing this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad28 Sep 2026
Nabil Jaadi 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.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Hans Mignolet 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. Adnan Castagne 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. Thorgan Castagne 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. Lois Courtois 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.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Seraing 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 Seraing 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 Hemsley Akpa-Chukwu, and the manager let it.
Squad21 Sep 2026
Kevin Bukusu falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
The 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.
It is a specific kind of quiet, a ground watching a winning position dissolve. Eupen kept coming because nothing stopped them, and Seraing will be asked about the last half hour all week.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Nabil Jaadi was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Seraing asked and Urawa Reds 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 22-year-old it feels ownership of. Thiago Paulo da Silva has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Seraing can pretend not to have heard.
Boardroom7 Sep 2026
Seraing close the window on a squad of their own making
3 in and 5 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.
Seraing had done everything except persuade the man himself. He stays at Sanfrecce Hiroshima, and the manager goes back to the drawing board with the money still in the bank.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Seraing this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad7 Sep 2026
Abdoulaye Bâ falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
The manager has re-ordered his thinking and Édouard Soumah-Abbad 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.
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 Nick Gillekens is on 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 Seraing can pretend not to have heard.
The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 4 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
Seraing asked and Standard Liege said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
KV Kortrijk left with the points after a 0‑1 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
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 Thomas Courtois 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 Seraing, and it is not being withdrawn.
Everything agreed with Standard Liege, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
The approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.
Squad24 Aug 2026
Nabil Jaadi 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.
Thierno Gaye 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 are things I liked and things we will be doing on Tuesday until they are right.” 0‑0, and a manager who had already decided what Tuesday looked like.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Racing Genk have kept their man, and Seraing go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
The number the board signed off was not enough. It has been asked again and raised its own offer to $3.7M — a club that wants Kyan Vaesen enough to be asked twice.
Seraing had done everything except persuade the man himself. He stays at Racing Genk, and the manager goes back to the drawing board with the money still in the bank.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Nabil Jaadi was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
RWDM left with the points after a 0‑1 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
The dugout17 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 Thomas Courtois to a room that had heard them before.
The offer went to OH Leuven 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.
Noah Solheid 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 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.
Successful dribbles: 17. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
The dugout10 Aug 2026
The view from the dugout
“We controlled it. There were spells I did not like and we will look at them, but the group showed me something.” Thomas Courtois, on a 2‑0 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Nick Gillekens and Seraing agree another 2 years.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Noah Solheid 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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Sint-Truiden have kept their man, and Seraing go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 21-year-old it feels ownership of. Thiago Paulo da Silva 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 point taken on 87 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.