“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Words at Gabala training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Paulinho Souza 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 dugout14 Sep 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 Maksim Bayramov left the room before anybody could ask which.
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.
He is doing things on a Saturday afternoon that nobody around him can answer, which is flattering for about one season and a problem after that. Gabala will not keep him by pretending otherwise.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Gabala, another week without a signature from Eldar Kuliev.
The deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 25 arrived, 4 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed one.
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: another club keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
The deal that would have taken Prince Owusu to Imishli has collapsed at the last stage, and he reports back to Gabala with a summer to forget and a season still to play. Nobody is saying which side walked away.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Jaime Sierra was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Stéphane Acka 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.
14 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.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Shimal waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Gabala is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
The fee is $1.0M, the contract is signed, and the argument about whether he is worth it can begin. Zira drove a hard bargain; time will say who won it.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Gabala have done the hard part with Athletico Paranaense, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: Coritiba keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
It is the rarest sequence in football: supporters ask for something, and the club goes and does it. $1.0M for Eldar Kuliev, and for one week nobody is complaining about anything.
Eldar Kuliev has gone, the accounts have $1.0M 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.
Zira had done everything except persuade the man himself. He stays at Imishli, and the manager goes back to the drawing board with the money still in the bank.
The offer from Sumgayit for Leroy-Jacques Mickels 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.
The number the board signed off was not enough. It has been asked again and raised its own offer to $1.1M — a club that wants Ezekiel Morgan enough to be asked twice.
Everything agreed with another club, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Wycombe Wanderers have kept their man, and Zira go back to a list with one name crossed off 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 Zira this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
In brief
The dugoutThe manager has not finished forgetting Ismayil Ibrahimli's mistake
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: Sport Recife keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
Zira offered $260.0K; Imishli said it was not close. The manager will be told the money is still there for the right player, which is what managers are told.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Admira Wacker have kept their man, and Zira 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.
“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; Zira are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Every long career reaches the week the player starts thinking about the last one. He would like it to be at the club that first put him on a pitch, and Zira now know that too.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Zira, another week without a signature from Ismayil Ibrahimli.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Zira this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.