Marked for Andrey Shevtsov
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market11 Jan 2027
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Tver can pretend not to have heard.
The dugout11 Jan 2027
“I was told what my role would be, and I signed on that basis. It has not happened.” A grievance with a date attached is the hardest kind to settle.
Squad11 Jan 2027
At 21 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.
Squad11 Jan 2027
Tempers go at Tver
Kirill Dudkin 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.
Squad11 Jan 2027
A row about effort at Tver
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Yegor Ponomarev was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout11 Jan 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.
Player ratings11 Jan 2027
Successful dribbles: 16. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
Player ratings11 Jan 2027
A mark of 7.95, and nobody in the ground would argue with it. He was involved in everything that mattered and most of what did not.
Loan watch11 Jan 2027
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Tver, and 0 appearances in 21 say he has earned the hearing.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad23 Nov 2026
Words exchanged at Tver
Kirill Dudkin 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.
Squad23 Nov 2026
The injury that keeps coming back, keeps being rushed back from, and quietly costs more careers than the dramatic ones. 14 days is the estimate; the honest figure depends on whether anybody is patient.
Squad23 Nov 2026
“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 Tver know it.
Squad23 Nov 2026
Yegor Ponomarev 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.
Match21 Nov 2026
Beaten 0‑1, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
The dugout23 Nov 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 Alexey Fomin left the room before anybody could ask which.
Player ratings23 Nov 2026
Successful dribbles: 14. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
The dugout23 Nov 2026
The manager makes an example of Andrey Shevtsov
“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 dugout23 Nov 2026
Ivan Pugachevskiy has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at Tver 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.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad16 Nov 2026
Tempers go at Tver
Kirill Dudkin 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.
The dugout16 Nov 2026
Milan Mráz gets it from the manager
“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.
Loan watch16 Nov 2026
“I watch every Tver game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at PSK Pervorechenskoe runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
The dugout16 Nov 2026
The manager has not finished forgetting Milan Mráz's mistake
Publicly it is behind everybody. It is not behind the man who picks the team, and the only place that shows is a team sheet. He will get another chance; he will get it in a match that matters less.
The dugout16 Nov 2026
Nikita Yeremenko has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at Tver 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.
Market16 Nov 2026
The name of Anton Khomyakov keeps appearing in other people's back pages. Tver say nothing, which says plenty.
The dugout16 Nov 2026
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Andrey Shevtsov trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Squad16 Nov 2026
The least glamorous thing a foreign signing ever does and the one that decides most of them. A player who can hear the shout behind him is a different footballer from one who cannot.
Squad16 Nov 2026
The shrug has gone, the language is coming, and he now argues in training like somebody who expects to be here next year. Half a signing's value is this and none of it appears on a fee.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad12 Oct 2026
41 days out for Muslim Nabiev after a fracture
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Tver will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
The dugout12 Oct 2026
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Tver may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Squad12 Oct 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 Tver this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad12 Oct 2026
At 19 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.
Market12 Oct 2026
One of our own: Zakhar Mitin joins the Tver first team
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Zakhar Mitin is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Squad12 Oct 2026
Islam Zangiev 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 dugout12 Oct 2026
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 dugout12 Oct 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.
Market12 Oct 2026
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Tver know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.