Marked for Sergey Mokrousov
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market30 Dec 2030
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what AZAL can pretend not to have heard.
Squad30 Dec 2030
Tempers go at AZAL
Cavid Bayramov 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.
Squad30 Dec 2030
Cəlal Hüseynov 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.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad11 Mar 2030
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at AZAL this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad11 Mar 2030
Words at AZAL training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Cəlal Hüseynov 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.
Squad11 Mar 2030
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Sergey Mokrousov, and the manager let it.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market31 Dec 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 The request is on a desk at AZAL, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad31 Dec 2029
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” AZAL may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Squad31 Dec 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 AZAL this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad24 Dec 2029
“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.
Squad24 Dec 2029
Tempers go at AZAL
Cəlal Hüseynov 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.
Squad24 Dec 2029
Savely Anisimov 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.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad5 Nov 2029
A knee injury of the worst kind for Abdallah Aberkane
35 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. AZAL lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Match3 Nov 2029
The run at home goes on for AZAL
16 matches unbeaten here. Every visiting manager is asked about it in the week before, which is precisely why it keeps going.
Market5 Nov 2029
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what AZAL can pretend not to have heard.
Match3 Nov 2029
Still nobody has beaten AZAL
The unbeaten run reaches 7. Some of them were wins and some were escapes, but a side that refuses to lose is a side other dressing rooms talk about.
Squad5 Nov 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 AZAL this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad5 Nov 2029
“The easiest signature of my career.” Kamran Madatov and AZAL agree another 2 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Player ratings5 Nov 2029
Successful dribbles: 19. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad5 Nov 2029
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Denis Sharapov, and the manager let it.
Player ratings5 Nov 2029
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.02, and no argument anywhere in the ground.