Patrick

Right Back - Flora
30 May 2030
Thursday
Process

Marked for Patrick

200 Edition

The Flora Herald

27 May 2030
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Squad

The knee: Taaniel Usta out for 21 days

21 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Flora lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.

Squad

Danil Kuraksin takes the match ball home

3 goals in one afternoon from one man. The other players were also present, a witness confirmed.

Player ratings

Bubacarr Trawally, 35, rolls back the years — 8.21

There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.21 at 35, and nobody on the pitch was better.

Market

Patrick puts it in writing

“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 The request is on a desk at Flora, and it is not being withdrawn.

Player ratings

Georgi Tunjov was unplayable

Successful dribbles: 22. 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.

Squad

Tristan Toomas Teeväli in a row with a teammate

It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Flora this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.

Match

Danil Kuraksin the difference as Flora beat Parnu

Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Danil Kuraksin. 3‑1 against Parnu, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.

Squad

Words at Flora training over how hard people work

Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Georgi Tunjov 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.

Player ratings

Ninety minutes of Danil Kuraksin at his very best

Marked 8.63. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Flora.

In brief

Back issues
199 Edition

The Flora Herald

20 May 2030
From our football correspondent Steady

Squad

The knee: Taaniel Usta out for 28 days

28 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Flora lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.

The dugout

Patrick: that is not what I was promised

“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Flora have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.

Market

Roman Kravchenko has one foot out of the door

Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Flora they have already started talking about him in the past tense.

Squad

Tempers go at Flora

Tristan Toomas Teeväli 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.

Squad

A row about effort at Flora

Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Georgi Tunjov was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.

Squad

Home is on Patrick's mind

“Some mornings you wake up and you are still a long way from everything you know.” It is not the football and it never was; Flora are dealing with a man who wants a different country.

Boardroom

Wages swallow 91% of the Flora income

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 dugout

Rauno Sappinen gets picked when it counts

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 Rauno Sappinen is on it.

The dugout

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.” Joonas Hein chose the glass-half-full version of 0‑0; the supporters left with the other one.

In brief

192 Edition

The Flora Herald

1 Apr 2030
From our football correspondent Triumph

Squad

A knee injury of the worst kind for Artem Perepechko

42 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Flora lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.

Match

Flora run riot against Tammeka

4‑0, and the margin flattered nobody — it could have carried another goal or two without complaint. Afternoons like this are why people keep coming.

Match

Flora cannot stop winning

7 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.

Squad

Mark Anders Lepik takes the match ball home

3 goals in one afternoon from one man. The other players were also present, a witness confirmed.

Squad

Tristan Toomas Teeväli in a row with a teammate

It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Flora this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.

Match

The run at home goes on for Flora

9 matches unbeaten here. Every visiting manager is asked about it in the week before, which is precisely why it keeps going.

Squad

Balagie Darboe signs a new deal

“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Balagie Darboe commits to Flora for another 4 years.

Player ratings

A masterclass from Danil Kuraksin

Marked 8.50 — 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.

Player ratings

Ninety minutes of Mark Anders Lepik at his very best

Marked 8.46. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Flora.

In brief

190 Edition

The Flora Herald

18 Mar 2030
From our football correspondent Triumph

Squad

Artem Perepechko damages knee ligaments — 56 days out

The words a physio says slowly. 56 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.

Match

Flora tear Nomme Kalju apart

Rarely has this fixture seen a display like it: 3‑0 against Nomme Kalju, and it could have been more.

Match

Flora make it 5 in a row

Momentum is a hard thing to buy and an easy thing to lose, and right now Flora have 5 straight wins of it.

Player ratings

Tristan Toomas Teeväli pops up at the right end — 7.73

7.73, 1 on the scoresheet, and the specific comedy of a back-four player celebrating like somebody who does this every week. He does not, and that is exactly why the ground reacted the way it did.

Market

Only the photograph left for Alexandr Selyava

Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Alexandr Selyava will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Flora the goodbyes have quietly begun.

Squad

Georgi Tunjov 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.

Squad

A falling-out at Flora

Mark Anders Lepik and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.

Match

Nobody wins at Flora

8 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.

Player ratings

Georgi Tunjov was on a different afternoon to everybody else

8.40. 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.

In brief

182 Edition

The Flora Herald

21 Jan 2030
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Squad

Artem Perepechko damages knee ligaments — 114 days out

The words a physio says slowly. 114 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.

Market

Remo Valdmets turns Tulevik down

“It was not right for me. I am not going to explain why to anybody except the people I owe an explanation to.” A deal agreed between two clubs, and a player who declined to be part of it.

Market

Paide come back empty-handed

The bid was some way short and Flora did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.

Market

Roman Kravchenko has one foot out of the door

Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Flora they have already started talking about him in the past tense.

Squad

Tempers go at Flora

Tristan Toomas Teeväli 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.

Squad

Georgi Tunjov 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.

Squad

Patrick wants to go home

“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Flora can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.

The dugout

Kaur Kivila has become a man the manager trusts

Nobody at Flora 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.

Market

Tulevik are about to pick up the phone

A conversation is coming this week. Flora will put a number on him, and from there it stops being football and becomes arithmetic.

In brief

174 Edition

The Flora Herald

26 Nov 2029
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Squad

A knee injury of the worst kind for Aleksandar Aleksandrov

18 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Flora lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.

Squad

Tempers go at Flora

Tristan Toomas Teeväli 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.

Squad

Flora lose Taijo Vassiljev

18 days, the medical staff say, and medical staff are optimists by profession. The team sheet will look wrong without him.

Squad

Georgi Tunjov 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 dugout

When it matters, Kaur Kivila plays

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 dugout

Alexey Shalashnikov knocks on the manager’s door

“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Alexey Shalashnikov trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.

In brief

  • Market Experience through the door at Flora
  • The dugout Vladislav Lyakh keeps his manager's vote
  • Boardroom Flora board back the manager