It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Arsenal Dzerzhinsk this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Nikolay Sotnikov 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.
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 Alexandr Naumovich is on it.
“I was told what my role would be, and I signed on that basis. It has not happened.” A grievance with a date attached is the hardest kind to settle.
Squad18 Sep 2028
A muscle injury sidelines Yuriy Lovets for 14 days
Nobody makes a documentary about a hamstring and everybody in the game fears one. Arsenal Dzerzhinsk will be careful with the return date, because the second one is always worse than the first.
$560.0K was the most the club would pay and Slutsk were asking for more. Deals like this are revived in the last week of a window roughly half the time, and everybody involved knows it.
Ruslan Teverov 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.
Arsenal Dzerzhinsk ran out of time with Dinamo Brest. The paperwork was open when the deadline passed, and a transfer that was almost done is now a transfer that never happened.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Nikolay Sotnikov 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 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.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Ivan Tolkachev signs something — a contract at Arsenal Dzerzhinsk or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
In brief
MarketThe window shut and Ivan Oreshkevich is still in the building
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Dmitriy Matyash provided it, and the 9.24 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
The clubs have shaken hands with Baranovichi; the player has not yet. Personal terms are next, and personal terms are where more deals die than anybody prints.
Arsenal Dzerzhinsk offered $560.0K; Slutsk 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Arsenal Dzerzhinsk this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Nikolay Sotnikov 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.
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.
“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 Arsenal Dzerzhinsk, 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.” Arsenal Dzerzhinsk have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Add another name to the list: Volna Pinsk have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Yauhen Chalavach. The answer from Arsenal Dzerzhinsk has not changed — yet.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Yan Balanovich after 1‑2, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
Signed today, seen by nobody for years, and one of them may one day be the reason the club exists. That is the whole of the argument for an academy, and it is a good one.
Nobody at Arsenal Dzerzhinsk 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.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Yauhen Chalavach will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Arsenal Dzerzhinsk the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Dmitriy Matyash 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 had been thinking. Vladislav Vasiljev 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.
Successful dribbles: 19. 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.
Half the programme played, position 6, 19 on the board. Doubling it is the sum every supporter has done and the only one nobody at the club will do out loud.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 7.82 at 34, and nobody on the pitch was better.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Arsenal Dzerzhinsk this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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 8.16 — 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.
Conceding is one thing; the response is what tells you about a dressing room. Dmitriy Matyash had Arsenal Dzerzhinsk level again within 3 minutes, and Osipovichi never got to play with a lead at all.
Denis Polyakov 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.
Minute 94, against Slonim, and a goal that felt like a win to everybody who had stayed. It was a draw. Nobody leaving the ground will describe it as one.
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.
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 dugout22 May 2028
The manager’s verdict
“I am frustrated, honestly. We did enough to win and we did not win.” Yan Balanovich was not hiding it after 1‑1, and nobody in the Arsenal Dzerzhinsk dressing room was either.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Arsenal Dzerzhinsk they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Ivan Oreshkevich was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Behind, and beaten by any honest reading, until minute 88. Lida had the points in their pocket and a corner of the ground still believed, which is generally when it happens.
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 Alexandr Naumovich is on it.
“It is not the end of the world and it is not good enough. Both of those are true.” The manager, after a 1‑1 draw, said the honest thing and then went to say it again inside.
He used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against Uni-X Labs in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
Successful dribbles: 32. 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.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Arsenal Dzerzhinsk have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
“The easiest signature of my career.” Yuriy Lovets and Arsenal Dzerzhinsk agree another 3 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Dmitriy Matyash 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.
4 boys move up, and somewhere in the building the people who coached them at twelve are quietly having the best morning of their working year. Nothing about this shows up in a result and it is why the academy exists.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Uladzislau Volodko 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.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Egor Korzun 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.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Mikalai Dragun 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.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Arsenal Dzerzhinsk they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
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.
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 Daniel Volskiy is on it.
Position 3, 44 points, and the result everyone checks first is now theirs. The word is still not being said around the ground, which is how you know everyone is thinking it.
Dmitriy Matyash 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 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 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 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 had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Arsenal Dzerzhinsk, and both men came out saying it was fine.
32 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Arsenal Dzerzhinsk lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 9 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Yauhen Chalavach will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Arsenal Dzerzhinsk the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Denis Polyakov 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.
10 goals in 18 games at Volna Pinsk — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Arsenal Dzerzhinsk updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
83 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Arsenal Dzerzhinsk lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Arsenal Dzerzhinsk is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
“The easiest signature of my career.” Ivan Oreshkevich and Arsenal Dzerzhinsk agree another 4 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 21-year-old it feels ownership of. Mark Mokin 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.
Successful dribbles: 19. 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.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Mark Mokin. 1‑0 against Uni-X Labs, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Two goals and a mark of 8.94 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Ninety minutes of very little, and then everything at once. The winner arrived in the 85th, and Molodechno spent what remained of the match appealing to the referee rather than chasing the ball.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Arsenal Dzerzhinsk this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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 players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 2‑1, Yan Balanovich could afford to be generous.