Marked for Alexandr Grigorjev
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market26 Jun 2028
The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.
Squad26 Jun 2028
Tempers go at Kaluga
Yuriy Kovalev 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.
Squad26 Jun 2028
The manager makes an example of David Ciurel
“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.
Market26 Jun 2028
The Sergio Leiva story refuses to die
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Sergio Leiva signs something — a contract at Kaluga or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Market26 Jun 2028
1 months left and the two sides are nowhere near each other. Every week this drags on takes money off what Kaluga could get for him.
Market26 Jun 2028
The list is a quiet document with a loud meaning. Yegor Skorobogatko may talk to anybody who asks, and everybody at the club understands what that means.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market10 Apr 2028
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Kirill Balashov will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Kaluga the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad10 Apr 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Kaluga this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad10 Apr 2028
“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
Uneasy
Market13 Dec 2027
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Kaluga is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad13 Dec 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 Kaluga this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad13 Dec 2027
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Alexandr Grigorjev, and the manager let it.
Squad13 Dec 2027
There is a level at which a footballer stops being tested and starts being contained, and he reached it some time ago. Kaluga know it, and so does everybody who watches him.
Market13 Dec 2027
He is 20, and nobody at Kaluga signed him for this season. Deals like this are judged in four years, by people who may not still be in the building.
Market13 Dec 2027
Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Sergio Leiva’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market15 Nov 2027
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Kirill Balashov will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Kaluga the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad15 Nov 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 Kaluga this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Market15 Nov 2027
Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Sergio Leiva’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad8 Nov 2027
74 days, the scan says, and scans are kinder than reality. The fixtures in that window have just become somebody else’s job.
Squad8 Nov 2027
Tempers go at Kaluga
Yegor Skorobogatko 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.
Squad8 Nov 2027
“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
Market20 Sep 2027
Sergio Leiva hands in a written request
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Kaluga can pretend not to have heard.
Market20 Sep 2027
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Kaluga they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Player ratings20 Sep 2027
Successful dribbles: 27. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Match18 Sep 2027
The wait goes on for Kaluga
4 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.
Squad20 Sep 2027
“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; Kaluga are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Squad20 Sep 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 Kaluga this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Match18 Sep 2027
Still nobody has beaten Kaluga
The unbeaten run reaches 6. Some of them were wins and some were escapes, but a side that refuses to lose is a side other dressing rooms talk about.
Squad20 Sep 2027
“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.
Player ratings20 Sep 2027
Marked 7.52 on an afternoon he ran from the first whistle to the last. Whatever else went wrong, Kaluga had the best player on the pitch.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad12 Jul 2027
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Yuriy Kovalev commits to Kaluga for another 2 years.
Squad12 Jul 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 Kaluga this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Boardroom12 Jul 2027
86% of the income goes out in wages at Kaluga
Every club in football pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time somebody has tried it.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Match5 Jul 2027
Kaluga refuse to drop out of the race
Position 1, 21 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.
Market5 Jul 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.
Market5 Jul 2027
The shirt still fits. Alexandr Grigorjev is back at Kaluga, and half the ground remembers him in these colours already. Some signings need selling to the town; this one sold itself.
Squad5 Jul 2027
Tempers go at Kaluga
Yuriy Kovalev 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 Jul 2027
This league is too small for Yuriy Kovalev
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. Kaluga will not keep him by pretending otherwise.
Squad5 Jul 2027
“I would rather say it to his face than read about it.” The meeting was requested by the player, which tells you most of what you need to know.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
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
“The easiest signature of my career.” Ivan Matyushenko and Kaluga agree another 4 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Market8 Feb 2027
Tyumen paid $110.0K and Kaluga took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
Squad8 Feb 2027
David Ciurel in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Kaluga this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad8 Feb 2027
Sergio Leiva asks for a word with the manager
“I would rather say it to his face than read about it.” The meeting was requested by the player, which tells you most of what you need to know.
Market8 Feb 2027
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Ivan Matyushenko signs something — a contract at Kaluga or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Boardroom2 Nov 2026
Wages eat 901% of everything Kaluga 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.
Loan watch2 Nov 2026
“I did not go to Torpedo Vladimir to sit and watch. I want to come back to Kaluga and fight for my place.” 2 appearances in 9 matches say the rest.
Squad2 Nov 2026
The award is a small thing with a heavy meaning: for four weeks nobody in this division did his job better. Kaluga have the trophy on a shelf and the player in the side.