Marked for Christopher Figueroa
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market5 Apr 2027
“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 The request is on a desk at Avangard, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad5 Apr 2027
Alexey Sukharev 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.
Squad5 Apr 2027
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Denis Traigel and Avangard agree another 4 years.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market8 Mar 2027
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Avangard can pretend not to have heard.
Squad8 Mar 2027
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Rizvan Tashaev commits to Avangard for another 4 years.
Squad8 Mar 2027
Carlos Zepeda 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.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Match1 Mar 2027
Avangard sink to position 7
13 points, and a fixture list that is running out. The mathematics are not yet cruel, but they are no longer kind.
Market1 Mar 2027
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
Squad1 Mar 2027
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Avangard this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad1 Mar 2027
Words at Avangard training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Carlos Zepeda 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.
Squad1 Mar 2027
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and Avangard know it.
Squad1 Mar 2027
The manager makes an example of Franco Saucedo
“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.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market8 Feb 2027
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
Squad8 Feb 2027
A muscle injury sidelines Dmitry Zakharov for 15 days
Nobody makes a documentary about a hamstring and everybody in the game fears one. Avangard will be careful with the return date, because the second one is always worse than the first.
Squad8 Feb 2027
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and Avangard know it.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Match4 Jan 2027
Avangard are in real trouble now
Position 7, 13 points, and a fixture list with fewer games left in it than excuses. The arithmetic is not cruel yet, but it has stopped being kind.
Market4 Jan 2027
“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 Avangard, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad4 Jan 2027
There are footballers who have a good season and footballers a season is remembered for, and the second kind get their names read out in a hall in the summer. Avangard will be quietly delighted and privately nervous.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad28 Dec 2026
Alexey Sukharev 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.
Boardroom28 Dec 2026
Wages eat 174% of everything Avangard earn
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.
Squad28 Dec 2026
The manager makes an example of Bastián Pinto
“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.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match12 Oct 2026
Avangard sink to position 7
12 points, and a fixture list that is running out. The mathematics are not yet cruel, but they are no longer kind.
Match10 Oct 2026
No end in sight to Avangard's wait for a win
9 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Avangard has to find a result from somewhere.
Squad12 Oct 2026
“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; Avangard are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Squad12 Oct 2026
Words at Avangard training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Carlos Zepeda 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.
Match10 Oct 2026
Beaten 0‑2, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Squad12 Oct 2026
“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.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad14 Sep 2026
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 6 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Player ratings14 Sep 2026
Denis Traigel, 20, plays like he has been here for years — 7.64
A mark of 7.64 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 20-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Match12 Sep 2026
4 matches without a win for Avangard
The run now stands at 4, and the questions being asked around Avangard are no longer polite ones.
Match12 Sep 2026
4 matches without a goal for Avangard
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.
Squad14 Sep 2026
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Avangard this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The terraces14 Sep 2026
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.
Squad14 Sep 2026
The manager makes an example of Carlos Zepeda
“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.
Player ratings14 Sep 2026
Successful dribbles: 17. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Player ratings14 Sep 2026
16 defensive actions and a clean sheet at the end of them. A defender's afternoon can only be told by what did not happen, which is why nobody makes a highlights package out of one and every manager in the division would take it.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad24 Aug 2026
Branko Gezan gets the move he always wanted
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Branko Gezan has just signed for Avangard, and for once the answer mattered.
Player ratings24 Aug 2026
No sign of nerves from Denis Traigel at 20 — 8.41
The hardest thing about being 20 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Denis Traigel did not need any: 8.41, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Player ratings24 Aug 2026
25 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.
Market24 Aug 2026
The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.
Squad24 Aug 2026
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Branko Gezan commits to Avangard for another 3 years.
Squad24 Aug 2026
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Avangard this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad24 Aug 2026
Words at Avangard training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Danila Knyazev 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 terraces24 Aug 2026
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Christopher Figueroa 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.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Market10 Aug 2026
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Avangard can pretend not to have heard.
Squad10 Aug 2026
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Franco Saucedo commits to Avangard for another 3 years.
Squad10 Aug 2026
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Avangard this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad10 Aug 2026
Words at Avangard training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Carlos Zepeda 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 terraces10 Aug 2026
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Dmitry Kumsarov 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.
Match8 Aug 2026
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Carlos Zepeda. 1‑0 against Kuban, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Player ratings10 Aug 2026
Marked 7.41. Ask anyone leaving the ground what settled it and you will get one name, which is the only award that has ever really counted.
Squad10 Aug 2026
5 new faces, and Avangard 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.
Market10 Aug 2026
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Avangard, another week without a signature from Victor Kozyrev.