Marked for Danil Voitenko
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Match5 Oct 2026
Every point is an argument now for Akron
Position 16 and 4 points, and the table gets read bottom-up in this part of town. The calendar has stopped being a schedule and started being a countdown.
Squad5 Oct 2026
A fracture rules Danil Voitenko out for 14 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Akron will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Player ratings5 Oct 2026
Successful dribbles: 24. 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.
Squad5 Oct 2026
A falling-out at Akron
Roberto Fernández and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Words at Akron training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Dudu 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.
The terraces5 Oct 2026
The crowd has taken to Yomar Rocha
At 23 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.
Match3 Oct 2026
Beaten 0‑2, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Player ratings5 Oct 2026
A performance of 8.19 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad28 Sep 2026
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 21 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Match26 Sep 2026
The wait goes on for Akron
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.
Squad28 Sep 2026
Words exchanged at Akron
Roberto Fernández 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.
Squad28 Sep 2026
Dudu 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.
Match26 Sep 2026
A bad afternoon for Akron against Sochi
1‑2 to Sochi, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
The dugout28 Sep 2026
“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.
Squad28 Sep 2026
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Akron can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
Player ratings28 Sep 2026
Successful dribbles: 16. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
The dugout28 Sep 2026
The manager’s verdict
“That is on me. I pick the team and I picked wrong.” Managers say that when they mean it and when they need to be seen to, and after 1‑2 Maxim Nikolayev left the room before anybody could ask which.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad21 Sep 2026
A fracture rules Danil Voitenko out for 29 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Akron will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Match19 Sep 2026
5 matches without a win for Akron
The run now stands at 5, and the questions being asked around Akron are no longer polite ones.
Match19 Sep 2026
5 matches without a goal for Akron
The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 5 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
Squad21 Sep 2026
Tempers go at Akron
Roberto Fernández 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.
The dugout21 Sep 2026
Nobody will confirm this and nothing else explains the last month of selections. A costly error buys a player a period of being second choice that is always longer than the error was.
The dugout21 Sep 2026
“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.
The dugout21 Sep 2026
The view from the dugout
“We did not lose. Some weeks that is all you get, and I would rather have the point than not.” Maxim Nikolayev chose the glass-half-full version of 0‑0; the supporters left with the other one.
Player ratings21 Sep 2026
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 13 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
Player ratings21 Sep 2026
Successful dribbles: 12. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad14 Sep 2026
There were 13 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.
Match12 Sep 2026
Nowhere to hide for Akron
0‑6 against Lokomotiv Moscow, and no complaints that would survive the replay. The manager spoke about character afterwards; the terraces used shorter words.
Market14 Sep 2026
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Akron can pretend not to have heard.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 36 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Boardroom14 Sep 2026
Window shuts: 3 in, 4 out at Akron
The deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 3 arrived, 4 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed one.
Match12 Sep 2026
4 matches without a win for Akron
The run now stands at 4, and the questions being asked around Akron are no longer polite ones.
Match12 Sep 2026
4 matches without a goal for Akron
The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 4 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
Match12 Sep 2026
Nobody could stop scoring
6 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Akron and Lokomotiv Moscow in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
Transfer targets14 Sep 2026
Arsenal Tula wanted more than $93.0K and the board would not go there. Walked away, for now, which in a transfer window means until somebody blinks.
In brief
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Squad
Words at Akron training over how hard people work
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The dugout
The manager makes an example of Rodrigo Escoval
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Boardroom
Doors closed at Akron