Marked for Gleb Protasenya
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Player ratings17 Jun 2030
Successful dribbles: 49. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
Match15 Jun 2030
Flora make home a hard place to visit
22 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere else.
Market17 Jun 2030
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Flora people have started saying his name in the past tense.
Match12 Jun 2030
Flora through in the cup
A 1‑0 win over Tammeka, and the draw for the next round can be watched with some interest for once.
Market17 Jun 2030
Cody Twose 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 Flora can pretend not to have heard.
Match15 Jun 2030
Flora cannot stop winning
5 wins on the spin now, and the question has changed from whether the run ends to who ends it. Confidence like this cannot be bought; it has to be earned exactly this way.
The dugout17 Jun 2030
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Flora may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Squad17 Jun 2030
Balázs Rácz arrives at the club he grew up with
Every footballer has an answer to the question about his boyhood club, and most of them never get to act on it. Balázs Rácz has, at Flora, and the first month will show what that does to a man.
Market17 Jun 2030
Add another name to the list: Sogdiana have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Ewen Lamothe. The answer from Flora has not changed — yet.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Market17 Sep 2029
Sander Tovstik has one foot out of the door
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Flora they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Market17 Sep 2029
“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.
Squad17 Sep 2029
Words exchanged at Flora
Mark Anders Lepik 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.
Squad17 Sep 2029
Muhammed Jobe 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.
Squad17 Sep 2029
Flora are still strangers to each other
5 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.
Squad17 Sep 2029
Maxim Azarko has outgrown this division
There is a level at which a footballer stops being tested and starts being contained, and he reached it some time ago. Flora know it, and so does everybody who watches him.
The dugout17 Sep 2029
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 dugout17 Sep 2029
Matej Houser gets it from the manager
“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.
Match17 Sep 2029
Flora in the hunt for Europe
Position 4, 38 points, and a run-in that decides whether next season has Thursday nights in it. Nobody is calling it a race yet, which is what people say during one.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Market6 Aug 2029
“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 Flora, and it is not being withdrawn.
Market6 Aug 2029
The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.
Squad6 Aug 2029
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Flora this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Market6 Aug 2029
The name of Oscar Pihela has come up in conversations Flora were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Squad6 Aug 2029
A row about effort at Flora
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Tristan Toomas Teeväli was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Transfer targets6 Aug 2029
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Botev Plovdiv have kept their man, and Flora go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Market6 Aug 2029
Both sides expect a conversation in the coming days. Flora will name a price, and everything after that is arithmetic.
Squad6 Aug 2029
“The easiest signature of my career.” Evert Grünvald and Flora agree another 3 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Transfer targets6 Aug 2029
A loan move for Valentyn Horokh is in the works
Flora have made the call to Dynamo Kyiv. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Market16 Jul 2029
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Flora people have started saying his name in the past tense.
Market16 Jul 2029
“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 Flora, and it is not being withdrawn.
Market16 Jul 2029
Only the photograph left for Evert Grünvald
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Evert Grünvald will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Flora the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Transfer targets16 Jul 2029
Everything agreed with Rodina, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
Squad16 Jul 2029
Tempers go at Flora
Danil Kuraksin 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.
Squad16 Jul 2029
Words at Flora training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Tristan Toomas Teeväli 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.
Transfer targets16 Jul 2029
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Dynamo Kyiv have kept their man, and Flora go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Transfer targets16 Jul 2029
Slavia Prague have been asked whether they would lend him. Loans are agreed quickly or not at all, and this one will be one or the other by the weekend.
The dugout16 Jul 2029
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 Danil Kuraksin is on it.