36 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Van lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Van 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 Yuri Martirosyan was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Van, and 14 appearances in 42 say he has earned the hearing.
A year in and the city has not opened up, the language has not come, and lunch is eaten alone more often than anybody at Van would admit. It shows on Saturdays.
45 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Van lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
The board have said in public what they had been saying in private. Results between now and the next meeting decide it, and everybody in the building knows the arithmetic.
Jeremias 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.
“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 Van know it.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Gabriel Passos 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 squad has men who were signed by a particular manager and men who were merely inherited. Brian Oddei is in the first group, and the man who wanted him here is no longer in the building.
74 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Van lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
“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 The request is on a desk at Van, and it is not being withdrawn.
Jeremias 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.
At 39, 3 points below where he was, and a body that has started charging interest. It happens to all of them and it is still the hardest paragraph on this page.
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 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.
The shirt still fits. Mihran Hovhannisyan is back at Gandzasar, and half the ground remembers him in these colours already. Some signings need selling to the town; this one sold itself.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Gandzasar this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Every footballer has an answer to the question about his boyhood club, and most of them never get to act on it. Mihran Hovhannisyan has, at Gandzasar, and the first month will show what that does to a man.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 22-year-old it feels ownership of. Sousa 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.
200 games in this shirt, through managers and relegations and everything else. Service like it is disappearing from the game and the crowd knows what it is watching.
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Van can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
A midfielder is measured on whether the team functions when he is on the pitch, which is nearly impossible to see and completely obvious in retrospect. 9 actions, 7.21, and a manager who will not be substituting him again in a hurry.
“I watch every Van game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Gandzasar runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
In brief
The dugoutThe view from the dugout
SquadGabriel Passos falls out with a teammate over standards
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Van this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“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 Van know it.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Van, and 6 appearances in 14 say he has earned the hearing.
“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
Looking aheadVan take on the side everybody is chasing
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Gandzasar have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 21 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
Brandão 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.
“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.
Squad29 Mar 2027
Words at Gandzasar training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. João Rafael 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.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Van will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Van 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.
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Van can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
“I watch every Van game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Gandzasar runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Van will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
“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; Van are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Jeremias 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.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Van, and 0 appearances in 5 say he has earned the hearing.
Squad1 Mar 2027
Loris Armati 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.
João Nóbrega 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.
Gandzasar have made the call to Corinthians. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
Sport Recife 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.
Gandzasar have made the call to Confiança. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
Every shape has positions in it and this one does not have his. Gandzasar will either change the shape, change his job, or change his club, and he is waiting to hear which.
There is a level at which a footballer stops being tested and starts being contained, and he reached it some time ago. Gandzasar know it, and so does everybody who watches him.
Nobody at Gandzasar 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.
Jeremias 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.
Every shape has positions in it and this one does not have his. Van will either change the shape, change his job, or change his club, and he is waiting to hear which.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Van, another week without a signature from Gabriel Passos.
A new face in his position and a shirt he thought he owned suddenly up for discussion. Van have promised nothing, which is what clubs promise at this stage.
Gandzasar had done everything except persuade the man himself. He stays at Coritiba, and the manager goes back to the drawing board with the money still in the bank.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Annan Mensah was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Nobody at Gandzasar 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Van this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The offer from Ararat for Yuri Martirosyan 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.
Everybody at Van saw it before anybody said it, which is how this always goes. At 39 the decline is real and measurable — 3 points — and the only question left is how the club handles somebody it owes a great deal to.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Van, another week without a signature from Yuri Martirosyan.
5 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.
Khosrov Ghazaryan is 19, and Van have signed him for the player he will be rather than the one he is. The first team can wait; the point of a deal like this is the years it buys.
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation Van are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Yuri Martirosyan trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Jeremias 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.
Artur Kartashyan 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.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Van, and 2 appearances in 14 say he has earned the hearing.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Javier Torres trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
The least glamorous thing a foreign signing ever does and the one that decides most of them. A player who can hear the shout behind him is a different footballer from one who cannot.
He looks like a man who lives here now rather than one who is working here. It took most of a season, and at Van the difference is visible from the back of the stand.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Emerson Nike was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Nobody at Araks Ararat 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.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Albert Darbinyan trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Nothing in writing and nothing in public: a word about playing time, given face to face at Araks Ararat. The team sheets over the next month will show whether it was worth having.
The manager has re-ordered his thinking and William Ovalle has come out of it lower. He will be told it is temporary, and the players who have heard that before will avoid his eye.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Van, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Nothing is announced when this happens and everybody knows. He is a bigger part of the plan at Van than he was a month ago, and the training ground worked that out before the team sheet said so.
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.
Vladimir Khozin 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 happens to all of them and it is still the hardest paragraph a local paper has to write. 38 years old, 3 points down on where he was, and a body that has started charging interest on a career.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Emerson Nike was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“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 dugout19 Oct 2026
Somebody else is better right now than Demba Dièye
The team sheet says it in public every week until it changes. The only version of being dropped a footballer cannot argue with, and the one he takes hardest.
Clubs make promises constantly and the page usually only hears about them when they are broken. This one was honoured, and the dressing room noticed that faster than any supporter did.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Van, and 2 appearances in 10 say he has earned the hearing.
3 goals in 7 games at Araks Ararat — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Van updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
Jeremias 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.
At 37, 3 points below where he was, and a body that has started charging interest. It happens to all of them and it is still the hardest paragraph on this page.
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.
A new face in his position and a shirt he thought he owned suddenly up for discussion. Van have promised nothing, which is what clubs promise at this stage.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Sousa did not need any: 7.82, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Araks Ararat this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad21 Sep 2026
Emerson Nike 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.
Gualberto 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.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Van, and 1 appearances in 6 say he has earned the hearing.
That is the business done at Araks Ararat 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.
Vladimir Khozin and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad7 Sep 2026
Words at Araks Ararat training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Emerson Nike 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.
Signings arrive with a picture of the club in their head, and this one’s picture was bigger than the building. He will play well and he will be gone, in that order, and everybody knows it.
Squad7 Sep 2026
A place in the month's best eleven for Emerson Nike
Four or five weekends of consistency, judged against everybody in the division doing his job. Emerson Nike has come out of that comparison in the side, and Araks Ararat have had the benefit of every one of those afternoons.
Nobody will confirm it and the team sheets confirm it every week. One error has bought him a spell as second choice that is already longer than the error deserved.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Araks Ararat, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Ararat-Armenia-2 will want this one forgotten quickly: 10‑2, every duel lost, and a long ride home. Araks Ararat were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.
Two goals and a mark of 7.98 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Two goals and a mark of 6.50 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
At 34 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.10 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Vladimir Khozin 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.
12 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Araks Ararat and Ararat-Armenia-2 in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
Squad31 Aug 2026
Words at Araks Ararat training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Demba Dièye 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 kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Vladimir Yeremyan provided it, and the 8.17 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Two goals and a mark of 7.89 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
It finished 1-4. A cup exit is a disappointment; this was a public dismantling, and the difference between the two is the number of people who will still be talking about it in August.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Gagik Hovhanesyan is living that version at Araks Ararat, and it tends to show in the first month.
Vladimir Khozin 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.
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.
Every footballer has an answer to the question about his boyhood club, and most of them never get to act on it. Narek Baroyan has, at Araks Ararat, and the first month will show what that does to a man.
Everything agreed with Gandzasar, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: Alashkert keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Vladimir Yeremyan and Araks Ararat agree another 3 years.
Vladimir Khozin 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.
Squad10 Aug 2026
Words at Araks Ararat training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Demba Dièye 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.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Gevorg Simonyan is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Gevorg Haroyan 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. Sargis Simonyan 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.
“It was not right for me. I am not going to explain why to anybody except the people I owe an explanation to.” A deal agreed between two clubs, and a player who declined to be part of it.
Petros Avetisyan 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.