Marked for Egor Snapkov
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market28 Dec 2026
Only the photograph left for Ivan Vorobjev
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Ivan Vorobjev will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Uni-X Labs the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad28 Dec 2026
Egor Snapkov and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Boardroom28 Dec 2026
Wages eat 98% of everything Uni-X Labs 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.
Market28 Dec 2026
Rostislav Zaretskiy is 19, and Uni-X Labs 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.
Market28 Dec 2026
He is 18, and nobody at Uni-X Labs signed him for this season. Deals like this are judged in four years, by people who may not still be in the building.
Squad28 Dec 2026
The formation has left Ivan Vozrastov behind
Every shape has positions in it and this one does not have his. Uni-X Labs will either change the shape, change his job, or change his club, and he is waiting to hear which.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad14 Dec 2026
50 days, the medical staff say, and medical staff are optimists by profession. The team sheet will look wrong without him.
The dugout14 Dec 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.
Squad14 Dec 2026
Words at Uni-X Labs training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Ivan Vorobjev 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 dugout14 Dec 2026
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Matvey Svidinskiy trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
The dugout14 Dec 2026
Egor Snapkov has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at Uni-X Labs 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.
Market14 Dec 2026
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Uni-X Labs know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad16 Nov 2026
Matvey Svidinskiy and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
The dugout16 Nov 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Ivan Vorobjev, and the manager let it.
The dugout16 Nov 2026
“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
Uneasy
The dugout19 Oct 2026
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Uni-X Labs have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
The dugout19 Oct 2026
The manager makes an example of Evgeniy Ermola
“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
Vladimir Popov knocks on the manager's door
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Uni-X Labs, and both men came out saying it was fine.
The dugout19 Oct 2026
Egor Snapkov gets picked when it counts
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 Egor Snapkov is on it.
Market19 Oct 2026
The list is a quiet document with a loud meaning. Matvey Kovruk may talk to anybody who asks, and everybody at the club understands what that means.
Squad19 Oct 2026
A manager forgives a bad Saturday far more readily than a bad Tuesday, because one of them he can explain and the other one he chose. The reports this week have not been good.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad21 Sep 2026
Matvey Svidinskiy and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
The dugout21 Sep 2026
“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.
The dugout21 Sep 2026
Egor Snapkov gets picked when it counts
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 Egor Snapkov is on it.