1‑5 against Dinamo Minsk, and no complaints that would survive the replay. The manager spoke about character afterwards; the terraces used shorter words.
8 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.
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Smorgon may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Player ratings23 Aug 2027
Artem Devyaten, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 7.75
A mark of 7.75 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 21-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Defending was optional and nobody took up the option. 6 goals between Smorgon and Dinamo Minsk, and not one of the people who paid to be there will ask for the money back.
Valeriy Gorbachik was the name on every phone-in, and the club has gone and signed him for $95.0K. For one week the board can do no wrong, which is a week most boards never get.
18 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Smorgon lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the whole of the defence. 6 saves, several of them the kind nobody expects to see made, and ten outfield players who owe him a drink.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Smorgon have done the hard part with Arsenal Dzerzhinsk, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Egor Babich was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Roman Gribovskiy 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 phone has started ringing about Vadim Galko again, and this time the name on the line is Osipovichi. Smorgon are listening politely and promising nothing.
25 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Smorgon lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
6 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.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Artem Devyaten did not need any: 7.77, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
The deal with Dinamo Minsk is done in every sense but the one that puts him on the pitch. Nothing goes wrong at this stage, except on the occasions when it does.
Alexandr Naumovich 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.
33 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Smorgon lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
“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 Smorgon, and it is not being withdrawn.
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Smorgon may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Player ratings2 Aug 2027
Artem Devyaten, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 8.05
A mark of 8.05 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 21-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Isloch have accepted the money. What Smorgon do not yet have is the man, and between here and the photograph is a conversation about wages that both sides are dreading.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Smorgon this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad2 Aug 2027
Words at Smorgon training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Egor Babich 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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 21-year-old it feels ownership of. Artem Devyaten 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.
62 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Smorgon lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
2 in front and in complete control, and it finished with Torpedo-BelAZ the happier side. There is no version of this afternoon that Smorgon will enjoy reviewing.
“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 Smorgon, and it is not being withdrawn.
Player ratings5 Jul 2027
A brace, and Matvey Dukso takes the afternoon — 8.36
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Matvey Dukso provided it, and the 8.36 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Successful dribbles: 26. 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.
The offer went to Molodechno this week and it is theirs to answer. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loud the door closes.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Arsenal Dzerzhinsk have kept their man, and Smorgon go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
In brief
SquadWords at Smorgon training over how hard people work
The words a physio says slowly. 91 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.
Two goals and a mark of 8.95 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Smorgon is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Smorgon this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Successful dribbles: 20. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad7 Jun 2027
Words at Smorgon training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Matvey Dukso 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.
98 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Smorgon lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Alexandr Naumovich and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad31 May 2027
Words at Smorgon training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Egor Babich 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 at Smorgon 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.
Slutsk next, and one man in the Smorgon dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought of him.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the whole of the defence. 10 saves, several of them the kind nobody expects to see made, and ten outfield players who owe him a drink.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Smorgon can pretend not to have heard.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Vadim Galko will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Smorgon the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Egor Babich was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Artem Devyaten 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.
“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 Smorgon, and it is not being withdrawn.
Alexandr Naumovich and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad3 May 2027
Egor Babich 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.
Two goals and a mark of 9.68 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
The board had gone up, the arguing had started, and then the ball was in the net in the 96th minute. Gomel will replay every second of the added time for a week.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Artem Devyaten did not need any: 8.69, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Alexandr Naumovich 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 Matvey Dukso was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
At 21 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.
Alexandr Naumovich 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 Egor Babich was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Successful dribbles: 16. 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.
One weekend, judged against everybody else's. Egor Babich has come out on top of it, and for most footballers a weekly award is the only silverware a career ever produces.
Shots: 10. Goals: none. The chances were there and they were good ones, and they went into the stand, the goalkeeper's arms and the side netting in roughly that order.
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 Roman Gribovskiy is on it.
“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 Smorgon, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad29 Mar 2027
Egor Babich 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.
“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.
The crowd waited for a goal that never came. Vitebsk defended in numbers and left with what they came for, and the two sides could be playing still without troubling a scorer.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Artem Devyaten’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Smorgon needing him to play as if none of it matters.
Words at Smorgon training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Egor Babich 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 was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Smorgon this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“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.
The dugout22 Mar 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 Mikita Stasevich to a room that had heard them before.
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.
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.
He used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against Vitebsk in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
In brief
Player ratingsThe chances came and went for Artem Devyaten
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Smorgon they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Alexandr Naumovich and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad15 Mar 2027
Matvey Dukso 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.
He is 21 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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Smorgon can pretend not to have heard.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Smorgon have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Successful dribbles: 23. 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Smorgon this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad8 Mar 2027
Egor Babich 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.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Smorgon, another week without a signature from Alexandr Naumovich.
“There are things I liked and things we will be doing on Tuesday until they are right.” 1‑1, and a manager who had already decided what Tuesday looked like.
In brief
BoardroomNo investment in the facilities at Smorgon
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Smorgon can pretend not to have heard.
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Smorgon people have started saying his name in the past tense.
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at Vitebsk is saying, and nobody at Smorgon is enjoying the guessing.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Egor Babich was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Artem Devyaten 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.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Ivan Rios 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. Vadzim Skavysh 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.
In brief
Transfer targetsA loan move for Ivan Novichkov is in the works
The words a physio says slowly. 48 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.
Sergey Pushnyakov 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.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Neman know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
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 Tito Tito Yormie Jr. is on it.
Alexandr Naumovich 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 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 was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Smorgon this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad11 Jan 2027
Matvey Dukso 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 academy exists for exactly this morning. Artem Volodko 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.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Smorgon, another week without a signature from Evgeniy Karpovich.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Smorgon, and both men came out saying it was fine.
The words a physio says slowly. 81 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.
Dmitry Radikovskiy 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.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Neman, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Nobody at Neman 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.
Egor Babich 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.
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.
109 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Neman lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Maxim Kravtsov will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Neman the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Sergey Pushnyakov 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.
Volna Pinsk will keep picking him until June and will get nothing for him after it. Dmitriy Nizhnik has pre-agreed a move to Neman, and the only people who lose in that arrangement are the ones who let the contract run down.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Danil Ananka trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
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.
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 was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Smorgon this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad16 Nov 2026
Words at Smorgon training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Egor Babich 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.
In brief
The dugoutArtem Devyaten has become a man the manager trusts
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Neman have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Neman will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Neman is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Neman this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Neman, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Nobody at Neman 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.
Nothing is announced when this happens and everybody knows. He is a bigger part of the plan at Neman than he was a month ago, and the training ground worked that out before the team sheet said so.
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Smorgon may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Squad26 Oct 2026
Egor Babich 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.
Artem Devyaten 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.
19 signings in three months. Every one of them may be an upgrade and the team can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild that never appears in the transfer-window verdicts.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Smorgon, and both men came out saying it was fine.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Smorgon this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad19 Oct 2026
Words at Smorgon training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Nikita Melnikov 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 not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Smorgon told Nikita Melnikov something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Alexandr Naumovich trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Smorgon has been clear about where Yaroslav Yarotskiy stands, which is more than many ever get.
17 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Neman lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Neman is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Sergey Pushnyakov 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.
It will be explained as a change for the team and it may even be one. Nobody who has worn one believes that, and neither does the man who has just had it taken away.
Nobody at Neman 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.
Nothing in writing and nothing in public: a word about playing time, given face to face at Neman. The team sheets over the next month will show whether it was worth having.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Nikita Melnikov 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. Isloch had the points in their pocket and a corner of the ground still believed, which is generally when it happens.
7.96, and no serious argument from anybody who was there. Smorgon had eleven men on the pitch and one of them decided how it went.
Squad28 Sep 2026
19 new faces, and Smorgon 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.
“A point is a point and I will take it, but we should have had all three.” Mikita Stasevich after the 1‑1 draw, and the sentence every manager in the country said at some stage this weekend.
In brief
The dugoutSomebody else is better right now than Kirill Yelagin
SquadA Smorgon teenager takes the young player award
Artem Devyaten, 20, plays like he has been here for years — 7.87
A mark of 7.87 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.
Daniil Perov 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 Nikita Melnikov was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Successful dribbles: 16. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
The dugout21 Sep 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.” Mikita Stasevich kept it short after the 2‑0 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.
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.
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 Artem Devyaten is on it.
That is the business done at Smorgon until the window opens again. Whether it was enough will be answered on Saturdays rather than in a column, and the first Saturday is close.
The offer from Uni-X Labs for Vadim Galko 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Egor Babich was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Yauhen Gordeichuk is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
“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 Smorgon, and it is not being withdrawn.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 7 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Smorgon this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Nikita Melnikov 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. Neman have kept their man, and Smorgon go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Two or more conceded in each of the last 4 matches. It is not one mistake repeating itself, which would be the easier thing to fix; it is a different one every week.
The hardest thing about being 20 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Artem Devyaten did not need any: 8.59, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Smorgon asked and Orsha said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
At 20 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.
Marked 8.37 — 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.
Squad31 Aug 2026
Words at Smorgon training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Vladislav Kovalevich 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.
Behind, and beaten by any honest reading, until minute 90. Slavia Mozyr had the points in their pocket and a corner of the ground still believed, which is generally when it happens.
Gomel go through and Smorgon go home, 2‑5 the scoreline that did it. The dressing room will call the league the priority now, because that is what dressing rooms say.
There were 8 saves in it, and at least three that had no business being saves at all. The ten outfield players owe him a drink and they know it.
The terraces24 Aug 2026
A cup hiding at Gomel leaves Smorgon explaining themselves
2-5, and long before the end the away end had switched from encouragement to something considerably more pointed. Nobody rings a phone-in about losing narrowly.
The terraces24 Aug 2026
The ground has had enough
“We travel everywhere and we get this.” 7 of the 31 senior players heard it walking off, and the ones who did not hear it were not playing.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Smorgon this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
In brief
MatchErnest Tavkin among the goals in a wild afternoon
Smorgon asked and Shinnik said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Daniil Perov 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.
49 months left and silence from upstairs — no offer, no talks, nothing for his people to answer. Clubs that let a calendar do their negotiating usually end up negotiating with the calendar.