From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match4 Sep 2027
0-1 to Kosmos, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
Squad6 Sep 2027
The award is a small thing with a heavy meaning: for four weeks nobody in this division did his job better. Spartak Moscow 2 have the trophy on a shelf and the player in the side.
Squad6 Sep 2027
Oleg Reabciuk 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
Uneasy
Squad31 May 2027
A player who expected to start watched it instead. The manager will call it a decision for the team; Oleg Reabciuk will call it something else in private.
Squad31 May 2027
“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.
Squad31 May 2027
Ivan Starkov 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 Spartak Moscow 2, and both men came out saying it was fine.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market1 Mar 2027
“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.
Market1 Mar 2027
The interest is real enough to have reached print. Spartak Moscow 2 have said nothing, which in a transfer window is its own kind of answer.
Squad1 Mar 2027
The manager makes an example of Roman Frolov
“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.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match7 Nov 2026
The run now stands at 5, and the questions being asked around Spartak Moscow 2 are no longer polite ones.
Market9 Nov 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 Spartak Moscow 2 can pretend not to have heard.
Match7 Nov 2026
Irkutsk left with the points after a 1-2 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Squad9 Nov 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.
Squad9 Nov 2026
He wheeled away like a man who had been carrying it for months, because he had. Spartak Moscow 2 have their signing off the mark and one press-conference question retired.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market7 Sep 2026
Ivan Sorokin 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 Spartak Moscow 2 can pretend not to have heard.
Squad7 Sep 2026
At 18, Pavel Pelevin is already the best thing here
An average of 7.02 in a first team he is several years too young for. Spartak Moscow 2 have something, and by now the whole division has noticed.
Match5 Sep 2026
Hard to beat is not the same as winning, but 6 matches without defeat is a foundation Spartak Moscow 2 did not have in the autumn.
Match5 Sep 2026
A 3-1 win over Kosmos, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Squad7 Sep 2026
The award goes to Timofey Rozhkov, and nobody around here is inclined to argue with the choice.
Squad7 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.