148 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Sapovnela lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and Sapovnela know it.
Vitaly Shakhov 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.
39 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Sapovnela lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sapovnela this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
In brief
SquadJean falls out with a teammate over standards
46 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Sapovnela lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Ali Kachmar 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.
Squad2 Nov 2026
Words at Sapovnela training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Guus Joppen 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.
David Idaiye 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.
Squad21 Sep 2026
Words at Sapovnela training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Guus Joppen 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sapovnela this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Guus Joppen 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sapovnela this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“We are a long way apart, and pretending otherwise helps nobody.” Neither side is close, and the calendar is not on the club's side.
Squad7 Sep 2026
22 new faces, and Sapovnela are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
In brief
SquadDavid Idaiye asks for a word with the manager
Player ratingsZé Lopes spends the afternoon fouling
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Ali Kachmar is living that version at Sapovnela, and it tends to show in the first month.
Vitaly Shakhov 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 Aug 2026
Words at Sapovnela training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Guus Joppen 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.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Sapovnela, another week without a signature from Ali Kachmar.
Nobody makes a documentary about a hamstring and everybody in the game fears one. Sapovnela will be careful with the return date, because the second one is always worse than the first.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sapovnela this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Sapovnela, another week without a signature from David Idaiye.
The one version of being left out a player cannot argue with, and the one he takes worst. Somebody else has been better and the team sheet says so, in public, every week until it changes.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 7.93 at 35, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Tomáš Kučera 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.
Squad10 Aug 2026
Guus Joppen 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.
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.