Artur Shakh 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 manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Matúš Vojtko has his answer from Lechia; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
Nobody at Lechia 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.
Nobody will confirm it and the team sheets confirm it every week. One error has bought him a spell as second choice that is already longer than the error deserved.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Matúš Vojtko trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Kacper Tobiasz’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Lechia needing him to play as if none of it matters.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Lechia know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Still no offer on the table, and Karl Wendt’s deal keeps shrinking. In boardroom language, silence this long stops being an oversight and starts being an answer.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the whole of the defence. 7 saves, several of them the kind nobody expects to see made, and ten outfield players who owe him a drink.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Lechia have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Vladyslav Kochergin was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Marked 8.16 — 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.
Squad4 Oct 2027
Samuel Kováčik is the division's best young player this month
At 20 he has spent a month being better than everybody his age in the league, which is a different and harder thing than one good afternoon. Lechia will try very hard not to make too much of it.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Lechia, and 5 appearances in 16 say he has earned the hearing.
A player who expected to start watched it instead. The manager will call it a decision for the team; Matúš Vojtko will call it something else in private.
A month is long enough that nobody gets in by accident. Samuel Kováčik is in the division's best eleven for it, which is a quieter compliment than an award and a more reliable one.
In brief
The dugoutThe manager makes an example of Miłosz Kałahur
The dugoutArtur Serobyan has become a man the manager trusts
18 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Lechia lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
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.
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.
“We earned that. I asked them for a reaction and I got one, and now I want the same again on Saturday.” Grzegorz Buksa on a 1‑0 afternoon that pleased him more than he was prepared to show.
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.
The words a physio says slowly. 35 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.
“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 Lechia, and it is not being withdrawn.
The offer from Septemvri for Patryk Letkiewicz 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.
Matej Rodin 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.
Squad13 Sep 2027
Words at Lechia training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Vladyslav Kochergin 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.
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 words a physio says slowly. 43 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.
“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 Lechia, and it is not being withdrawn.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Lechia have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Boardroom6 Sep 2027
Lechia close the window on a squad of their own making
24 in and 13 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.
Squad6 Sep 2027
Words at Lechia training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Vladyslav Kochergin 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.
“I watch every Lechia game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at ŁKS Łódź runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
Everything was agreed until it was not, and Patryk Letkiewicz reports back to Lechia with a summer to forget. Neither club is saying who walked away from the table.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Dinamo Moscow have kept their man, and Lechia go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
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.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Septemvri waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Lechia is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
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.
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.
Lechia asked and Randers said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Artur Serobyan. 2‑0 against Slask, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
The name of Axel Holewiński has come up in conversations Lechia were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Lechia this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Lechia had done everything except persuade the man himself. He stays at FC Midtjylland, and the manager goes back to the drawing board with the money still in the bank.
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.
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.
A 2‑0 win over Puszcza Niepołomice, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Successful dribbles: 15. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
The dugout16 Aug 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.” Grzegorz Buksa, on a 2‑0 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Lechia have lost him in all but the paperwork.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Lechia this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
Squad26 Jul 2027
Words at Lechia training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Vladyslav Kochergin 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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Sparta Prague have kept their man, and Lechia go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Michal Piszczek 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. Mateusz Glik is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: Sparta Prague keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Vladyslav Kochergin was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Sparta Prague have kept their man, and Lechia go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Samuel Kováčik is 20, and Lechia 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.
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.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Bohdan Viunnyk trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
A year in and the language has not come, the city has not opened up, and he eats alone more often than anybody at Lechia would like to admit. It is showing on Saturdays.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Widzew Łódź have kept their man, and Lechia go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Lechia, another week without a signature from Vladyslav Kochergin.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Artur Serobyan signs something — a contract at Lechia or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Not a new contract, not a new number: a new place in the manager’s thinking, which is the only promotion in football that actually matters. Axel Holewiński has moved up it.
The registration window is open and the phone has started. Between now and the deadline this club will be linked with forty players and sign three, which is the usual ratio.
A season-long look at somebody else’s player: Kacper Tobiasz arrives from Legia with something to prove and a return ticket in the drawer. Good loans make everybody richer; this one starts Saturday.
“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 Lechia, and it is not being withdrawn.
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.
Artur Shakh 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.
“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.
The dugout24 May 2027
The manager has not finished forgetting Axel Holewiński's mistake
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.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Tomasz Neugebauer 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 Dawid Kurminowski signs something — a contract at Lechia or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
5 goals in 20 games at Hermannstadt — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Lechia updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each 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.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Artur Serobyan signs something — a contract at Lechia or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
In brief
The dugoutArtur Shakh knocks on the manager’s door
Words at Lechia training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Vladyslav Kochergin 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.
Miłosz Kałahur 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 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 Lechia will have to give him a reason to stay or an exit.
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.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Lechia, 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.
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 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.
Danylo Malov and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
The dugout12 Apr 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.” Grzegorz Buksa, on a 2‑1 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Alex Soboniak is 18, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Something was said to Dmytro Ledvii and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Boubou Diallo was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Grzegorz Buksa after 0‑1, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer 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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Tomasz Wójtowicz 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 player who expected to start watched it instead. The manager will call it a decision for the team; Bohdan Viunnyk will call it something else in private.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Lechia have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Indrit Mavraj 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.
Squad15 Mar 2027
Boubou Diallo 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.
“A point is a point and I will take it, but we should have had all three.” Grzegorz Buksa after the 0‑0 draw, and the sentence every manager in the country said at some stage this weekend.
Successful dribbles: 12. 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.
5 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 Vladyslav Kochergin 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.
Boubou Diallo 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.
Level with 87 minutes on the clock, after an afternoon Lechia had all but put away. Motor Lublin will call it a point earned; the home dressing room will call it two given away, and both of them are right.
An error at the back is a moment; an error in goal is a goal. Dmytro Ledvii knows it, the crowd knew it instantly, and there was nobody behind him to make it anything else.
The dugout8 Mar 2027
The manager has not finished forgetting Dmytro Ledvii's mistake
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.
He found out with everybody else, an hour before kick-off, from a sheet of paper on a wall. Nobody at Lechia pretended it was anything other than a decision about him.
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.
Miłosz Kałahur 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.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Lechia, another week without a signature from Vladyslav Kochergin.
Squad1 Mar 2027
Boubou Diallo 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.
“A point is a point and I will take it, but we should have had all three.” Grzegorz Buksa after the 0‑0 draw, and the sentence every manager in the country said at some stage this weekend.
Danylo Malov 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 Boubou Diallo was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“I did not go to ŁKS Łódź to sit and watch. I want to come back to Lechia and fight for my place.” 0 appearances in 5 matches say the rest.
The dugout22 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 1‑2 defeat, delivered by Grzegorz Buksa to a room that had heard them before.
Squad22 Feb 2027
6 new faces, and Lechia 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.
Warm-up bib, ninety minutes of watching, and a handshake at the end that fooled nobody. Big matches tell you who a manager trusts; this one told Anton Tsarenko.
The dugout22 Feb 2027
The manager has not finished forgetting Axel Holewiński's mistake
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.
Lechia asked and Udinese said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Lechia this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Successful dribbles: 19. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
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 2‑3 defeat, delivered by Grzegorz Buksa to a room that had heard them before.
Squad15 Feb 2027
Words at Lechia training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Maciej Zając 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.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Bohdan Viunnyk trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
An error at the back is a moment; an error in goal is a goal. Axel Holewiński knows it, the crowd knew it instantly, and there was nobody behind him to make it anything else.
The dugout25 Jan 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 Grzegorz Buksa to a room that had heard them before.
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.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 17 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Vladyslav Kochergin was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
3 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Lechia can tell you which week it ends in.
Tomasz Neugebauer 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.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Lechia this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The dugout21 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 0‑1 Grzegorz Buksa left the room before anybody could ask which.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Indrit Mavraj was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
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.
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 Raków Częstochowa.
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.
Words at Lechia training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Vladyslav Kochergin 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 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.
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.
Two goals and a mark of 8.67 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
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.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Artur Serobyan. 2‑0 against Pogon, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
The young player of the month award goes to a 21-year-old at Lechia who has looked like the finished article for four weekends running. The next four are the ones that decide whether he is.
Squad7 Dec 2026
A place in the month's best eleven for Dawid Drachal
Four or five weekends of consistency, judged against everybody in the division doing his job. Dawid Drachal has come out of that comparison in the side, and Lechia have had the benefit of every one of those afternoons.
The dugout7 Dec 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.” Grzegorz Buksa kept it short after the 2‑0 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.
Not a new contract, not a new number: a new place in the manager’s thinking, which is the only promotion in football that actually matters. Szymon Weirauch has moved up it.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Ivan Zhelizko signs something — a contract at Lechia or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
In brief
The dugoutRifet Kapić wants a proper job in this side
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Dawid Drachal did not need any: 8.19, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
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 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.
8.52. 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.
100 games in this shirt, through managers and relegations and everything else. Service like it is disappearing from the game and the crowd knows what it is watching.
Nobody will confirm it and the team sheets confirm it every week. One error has bought him a spell as second choice that is already longer than the error deserved.
Squad16 Nov 2026
Words at Lechia training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Indrit Mavraj 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.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Artur Serobyan signs something — a contract at Lechia or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Lechia have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Tomasz Neugebauer 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.
0‑1 to Jagiellonia, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
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 Grzegorz Buksa to a room that had heard them before.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Indrit Mavraj was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
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.
Marked 4.51. Nothing he attempted worked and by the hour mark he had stopped attempting much, which is the part a manager notices rather than the mistakes.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Ivan Zhelizko signs something — a contract at Lechia or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
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 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.
Player ratings26 Oct 2026
Artur Serobyan was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.08. 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.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Grzegorz Buksa after 1‑2, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
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.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Lechia know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Artur Shakh trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
15 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Lechia lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Dorian Sinkiewicz is 17, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
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.
Everybody saw it before anybody said it. At 39 the numbers say 3 points down on what he was, and the question for Lechia is how to handle a man they owe a great deal.
25 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Lechia lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 5 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 19 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
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 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.
Squad5 Oct 2026
10 new faces, and Lechia 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.
“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.
Words at Lechia training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Vladyslav Kochergin 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.
Artur Shakh 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 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.” Grzegorz Buksa chose the glass-half-full version of 0‑0; the supporters left with the other one.
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.
14 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.
Centre-halves are allowed forward twice a season and are judged on what they do when they get there. Vladyslav Kochergin scored, was marked 7.87, and got back before anybody noticed he had gone.
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at Heidenheim is saying, and nobody at Lechia is enjoying the guessing.
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 a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 21-year-old it feels ownership of. Dawid Drachal 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.
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.
Unirea Slobozia 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Indrit Mavraj was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
A loan enquiry to Heidenheim: cover, or a look at somebody the club cannot afford to buy yet. Either way the answer will come back inside the week.
The dugout17 Aug 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.” Grzegorz Buksa chose the glass-half-full version of 0‑0; the supporters left with the other one.
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.
Every footballer has an answer to the question about his boyhood club, and most of them never get to act on it. Vladyslav Kochergin has, at Lechia, 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 Vladyslav Kochergin was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Shakhtar have kept their man, and Lechia go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Tomasz Neugebauer 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 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.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Lechia, another week without a signature from Vladyslav Kochergin.
Still no offer on the table, and Rifet Kapić’s deal keeps shrinking. In boardroom language, silence this long stops being an oversight and starts being an answer.