Marked for Yehor Butenko
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad4 Aug 2031
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 105 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Transfer targets4 Aug 2031
$1.5M settles it between the clubs for Stav Toriel
Dynamo Kyiv have accepted the money. What Kolos do not yet have is the man, and between here and the photograph is a conversation about wages that both sides are dreading.
Market4 Aug 2031
Tymur Babych hands in a written request
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Kolos can pretend not to have heard.
Transfer targets4 Aug 2031
Everything agreed with LNZ, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
Squad4 Aug 2031
A falling-out at Kolos
Anton Salabai and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad4 Aug 2031
Yehor Butenko is a better footballer than he was
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 23 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.
Squad4 Aug 2031
Words at Kolos training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Artem Cheliadin 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.
Match2 Aug 2031
It finished 2‑1, and it was Anton Salabai’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Kolos.
The terraces4 Aug 2031
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.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad7 Jul 2031
133 days out for Daniil Khrypchuk after a fracture
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Kolos will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Squad7 Jul 2031
Danyil Sydoruk damages knee ligaments — 115 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 115 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.
Squad7 Jul 2031
A falling-out at Kolos
Elias Telles and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad7 Jul 2031
Yehor Butenko is a better footballer than he was
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 23 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.
Transfer targets7 Jul 2031
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.
The dugout7 Jul 2031
“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.
Market7 Jul 2031
Artem Harmash is 18, and Kolos 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.
Boardroom7 Jul 2031
Kolos sign 6 boys into the academy
None of them will be seen by anybody outside the training ground for three years, most of them will never play a senior match, and one of them might change the club. That is the whole proposition, and it is why academies exist.
Boardroom7 Jul 2031
A clause somebody insisted on years ago, in a negotiation nobody remembers, has just paid Kolos $1.3M. Artem Husol left a long time ago; the paperwork stayed.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad19 May 2031
Elias Telles 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 Kolos this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad19 May 2031
Vitalii Katrych 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.
The dugout19 May 2031
Daniil Khrypchuk has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at Kolos 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.
The dugout19 May 2031
Ardit Tahiri 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 Kolos, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Market19 May 2031
The Ibrahim Kané story refuses to die
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Ibrahim Kané signs something — a contract at Kolos or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
The dugout19 May 2031
A conversation in the manager’s office, and a commitment that came out of it. Promises like that are cheap to make and expensive to break, and Anton Salabai has written the date down.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market14 Apr 2031
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
Squad14 Apr 2031
A falling-out at Kolos
Elias Telles and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad14 Apr 2031
Words at Kolos training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Artem Cheliadin 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.
Squad14 Apr 2031
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Enoch Dzeble and Kolos agree another 3 years.
Squad14 Apr 2031
Dawid Polkowski wants to finish where he started
Every long career reaches the week the player starts thinking about the last one. He would like it to be at the club that first put him on a pitch, and Kolos now know that too.
The dugout14 Apr 2031
Anton Salabai knocks on the manager’s door
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Anton Salabai trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Market14 Apr 2031
Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Artem Cheliadin’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.
The dugout14 Apr 2031
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 Maksym Misanov is on it.
Market14 Apr 2031
Kolos have let the market know Yehor Butenko can be had. No price in the advert, but everyone in the trade knows roughly what it says.
In brief
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Boardroom
The Kolos production line keeps running
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The dugout
The manager comes out for Elias Telles
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Match
A season winding down at Kolos
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad17 Mar 2031
A falling-out at Kolos
Elias Telles and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad17 Mar 2031
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Dmytro Karavayev commits to Kolos for another 4 years.
The dugout17 Mar 2031
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Dmytro Karavayev, and the manager let it.
Squad17 Mar 2031
A row about effort at Kolos
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Oleksii Bezruchuk was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Squad17 Mar 2031
The formation has left Yehor Butenko behind
Every shape has positions in it and this one does not have his. Kolos will either change the shape, change his job, or change his club, and he is waiting to hear which.
Market17 Mar 2031
Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Artem Cheliadin’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.
The dugout17 Mar 2031
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.
The dugout17 Mar 2031
A conversation in the manager’s office, and a commitment that came out of it. Promises like that are cheap to make and expensive to break, and Daniil Khrypchuk has written the date down.
Market17 Mar 2031
No fee and no drama: Yehor Butenko has signed at Kolos, and the wage bill is the only line that moved.
In brief
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Boardroom
The Kolos production line keeps running
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Match
Mid-table, and Kolos know it
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Match11 Mar 2030
Vorskla are in real trouble now
Position 16, 14 points, and a fixture list with fewer games left in it than excuses. The arithmetic is not cruel yet, but it has stopped being kind.
Market11 Mar 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 Vorskla can pretend not to have heard.
Market11 Mar 2030
Alex Chidomere has one foot out of the door
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Vorskla they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
The dugout11 Mar 2030
news_b_frozen_out_of_the_side
Squad11 Mar 2030
A muscle injury and 17 days out for Artem Shabanov
The most common injury in the game and the most rushed back from. Vorskla will quote 17 days and will be careful with it, because the second one is always worse than the first.
Boardroom11 Mar 2030
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.
Squad11 Mar 2030
Orest Kuzyk 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 Vorskla this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad11 Mar 2030
Vladyslav Dubinchak 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.
Transfer targets11 Mar 2030
Vorskla asked and Astra said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match11 Feb 2030
Every point is an argument now for Vorskla
Position 16 and 13 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.
Market11 Feb 2030
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Vorskla have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Match9 Feb 2030
Chastening afternoon for Vorskla
A 0‑5 beating by Polissia was the sort of result that empties a stadium long before the final whistle.
Market11 Feb 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 Vorskla can pretend not to have heard.
The dugout11 Feb 2030
news_b_frozen_out_of_the_side
Match9 Feb 2030
The wait goes on for Vorskla
4 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.
Boardroom11 Feb 2030
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.
Market11 Feb 2030
Only the photograph left for Illia Davydok
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Illia Davydok will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Vorskla the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad11 Feb 2030
A falling-out at Vorskla
Orest Kuzyk and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.