Marked for Vsevolod Bykov
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad3 May 2027
Shahriyar Sadygov damages knee ligaments — 55 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 55 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Market3 May 2027
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Dinamo Vologda is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad3 May 2027
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Dinamo Vologda this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The dugout3 May 2027
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Daniil Antonenko, and the manager let it.
Boardroom3 May 2027
The accounts make uncomfortable reading. Wages first and ambition second is the order of business at Dinamo Vologda now.
The dugout3 May 2027
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.
Squad3 May 2027
“I have done everything asked of me in training and it has not changed a thing on a Saturday.” The most familiar complaint in football, and one Dinamo Vologda will have to answer with minutes or with a transfer.
Market3 May 2027
Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Anton Betyuzhnov’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.
The dugout3 May 2027
Danil Spodarets asks for a word with the manager
“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.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad5 Apr 2027
83 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Dinamo Vologda lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Market5 Apr 2027
Only the photograph left for Vsevolod Bykov
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Vsevolod Bykov will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Dinamo Vologda the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad5 Apr 2027
Artem Isik in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Dinamo Vologda this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The dugout5 Apr 2027
The manager makes an example of Stepan Obryvkov
“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.
Boardroom5 Apr 2027
The accounts make uncomfortable reading. Wages first and ambition second is the order of business at Dinamo Vologda now.
The dugout5 Apr 2027
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.
Squad5 Apr 2027
“I respect the manager and I am not going to sit here and pretend I am happy.” It is the most common sentence in football and it has never once been the end of a story.
Market5 Apr 2027
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Dinamo Vologda know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
The dugout5 Apr 2027
Gleb Gusev asks for a word with the manager
“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
Steady
Squad8 Mar 2027
A knee injury of the worst kind for Shahriyar Sadygov
111 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Dinamo Vologda lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Market8 Mar 2027
Vsevolod Bykov has one foot out of the door
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Dinamo Vologda they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Transfer targets8 Mar 2027
No thanks: Amir Batyrev rejects the move
Dinamo Vologda had done everything except persuade the man himself. He stays at Yenisey, and the manager goes back to the drawing board with the money still in the bank.
Squad8 Mar 2027
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Idan Vered and Dinamo Vologda agree another 2 years.
Transfer targets8 Mar 2027
$86.0K was the most the club would pay and Fakel were asking for more. Deals like this are revived in the last week of a window roughly half the time, and everybody involved knows it.
Transfer targets8 Mar 2027
The approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.
Squad8 Mar 2027
Danila Yezhkov and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
The dugout8 Mar 2027
“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.
Boardroom8 Mar 2027
The accounts are being read more closely than the results. Wages before ambition is the order of business now, and the manager has been told so.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad22 Feb 2027
The match ball belongs to Danila Yezhkov, whose 4 goals turned a difficult afternoon into a procession.
Match20 Feb 2027
5‑0, and the margin flattered nobody — it could have carried another goal or two without complaint. Afternoons like this are why people keep coming.
Market22 Feb 2027
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Dinamo Vologda have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Player ratings22 Feb 2027
Successful dribbles: 26. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Transfer targets22 Feb 2027
Dinamo Vologda had done everything except persuade the man himself. He stays at Chernomorets, and the manager goes back to the drawing board with the money still in the bank.
Player ratings22 Feb 2027
Marked 10.00 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
Squad22 Feb 2027
Artem Isik 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.
Boardroom22 Feb 2027
Wages swallow 137% of the Dinamo Vologda income
Every club 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 it has been tried.
Player ratings22 Feb 2027
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.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Player ratings18 Jan 2027
Successful dribbles: 28. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
Squad18 Jan 2027
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Dinamo Vologda can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
Squad18 Jan 2027
Daniil Krivoruchko and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
The terraces18 Jan 2027
He is 22 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.
Match16 Jan 2027
It finished 2‑0, and it was Danila Yezhkov’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Dinamo Vologda.
Squad18 Jan 2027
Danila Yezhkov 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.
Player ratings18 Jan 2027
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.05, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
The dugout18 Jan 2027
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Danila Kalin, and the manager let it.
The dugout18 Jan 2027
The manager’s verdict
“I am not going to get carried away and I will not let them either. It was a good day. There will be harder ones.” Semyon Zabolotsky kept it short after the 2‑0 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Player ratings19 Oct 2026
Successful dribbles: 19. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
Match17 Oct 2026
Baltika 2 left with the points after a 0‑1 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
The dugout19 Oct 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 0‑1 Semyon Zabolotsky left the room before anybody could ask which.
The dugout19 Oct 2026
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Dinamo Vologda told Daniil Krivoruchko something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
The dugout19 Oct 2026
The manager makes an example of Gleb Gusev
“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
Danila Yezhkov has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at Dinamo Vologda 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.
Looking ahead19 Oct 2026
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Danil Spodarets’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Dinamo Vologda needing him to play as if none of it matters.
Market19 Oct 2026
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Andrey Yakovlev signs something — a contract at Dinamo Vologda or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Squad19 Oct 2026
At 37 he is in the side on merit and somebody else is watching from the bench. Places at Dinamo Vologda are won quietly and lost loudly.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Match12 Sep 2026
The 88th minute, half the ground already edging towards the exits, and Anton Betyuzhnov decided nobody was going anywhere. Irkutsk had no time left to answer.
Boardroom14 Sep 2026
Deadline passes with 17 signed and 4 gone
That is the business done at Dinamo Vologda 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.
Transfer targets14 Sep 2026
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: Rodina keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
Player ratings14 Sep 2026
Successful dribbles: 21. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
Transfer targets14 Sep 2026
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Rodina have kept their man, and Dinamo Vologda go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Match12 Sep 2026
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Anton Betyuzhnov. 2‑1 against Irkutsk, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Oleg Kozachenko 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.
Transfer targets14 Sep 2026
The window shuts on the Yaroslav Dol deal
Dinamo Vologda ran out of time with Nart. The paperwork was open when the deadline passed, and a transfer that was almost done is now a transfer that never happened.
Player ratings14 Sep 2026
Marked 8.23 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Match19 Aug 2026
A 3‑0 win over Rubin Yalta, and the draw for the next round can be watched with some interest for once.
Player ratings24 Aug 2026
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 9.12, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
Match22 Aug 2026
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.
Player ratings24 Aug 2026
Marked 7.99 at 19, in a side that makes no allowances for age. He did not need any, and he looked the least nervous man on the pitch.
Player ratings24 Aug 2026
Successful dribbles: 22. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Transfer targets24 Aug 2026
Dinamo Vologda asked and Krasnodar said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Match22 Aug 2026
Kolomna made Dinamo Vologda work for it, but the scoreboard read 2‑1 at the end and the table does not ask how.
Squad24 Aug 2026
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Dinamo Vologda this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The terraces24 Aug 2026
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 22-year-old it feels ownership of. Stepan Obryvkov 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.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Player ratings3 Aug 2026
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 8.64, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
Player ratings3 Aug 2026
Vsevolod Bykov, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 7.96
A mark of 7.96 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 21-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Market3 Aug 2026
The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.
Boardroom3 Aug 2026
He will play here until the summer and then walk out of the door for free, having already signed elsewhere. Supporters will manage the first part of that sentence; it is the second they will struggle with.
Squad3 Aug 2026
“The easiest signature of my career.” Andrey Yakovlev and Dinamo Vologda agree another 3 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Transfer targets3 Aug 2026
Dinamo Vologda have gone to Luki-Energiya with a bid, and the supporters have gone to the internet with an opinion about it. Whether either changes anything is up to the selling club.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Artem Isik 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.
Match1 Aug 2026
A 3‑2 win over Luki-Energiya, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
The terraces3 Aug 2026
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 21-year-old it feels ownership of. Vsevolod Bykov 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.