14 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.
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Chertanovo, and it is not being withdrawn.
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.
Boardroom2 Nov 2026
276% of the income goes out in wages at Chertanovo
Every club in football 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 somebody has tried it.
A month is long enough that nobody gets in by accident. Dmitry Kondrashov is in the division's best eleven for it, which is a quieter compliment than an award and a more reliable one.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 20 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.
Beaten 1‑2, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Squad12 Oct 2026
Words at Chertanovo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Raimundo Álvarez 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 Chertanovo this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Artem Selyukov 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.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Ivan Polyakov 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.
Boardroom5 Oct 2026
414% of the income goes out in wages at Chertanovo
Every club in football 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 somebody has tried it.
19 defensive actions and a clean sheet at the end of them. A defender's afternoon can only be told by what did not happen, which is why nobody makes a highlights package out of one and every manager in the division would take it.
Artem Selyukov 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 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 20 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.
“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.
Squad21 Sep 2026
12 new faces, and Chertanovo 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.
“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 Chertanovo, and 0 appearances in 5 say he has earned the hearing.
Hayden McGhan is 18, and Chertanovo 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.
7 games without scoring. Strikers stop looking up, midfielders take the extra touch, and every shot that clears the bar is followed by a groan that has been building since the last goal.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Words at Chertanovo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Ivan Polyakov 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.
16 defensive actions and a clean sheet at the end of them. A defender's afternoon can only be told by what did not happen, which is why nobody makes a highlights package out of one and every manager in the division would take it.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Chertanovo can pretend not to have heard.
The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 6 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
Squad7 Sep 2026
Ivan Polyakov 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.
There is a figure at which a wage bill stops being ambitious and becomes the reason nothing else is possible, and this club has reached it. Nothing is left over for a transfer, a stand or a rainy afternoon.
Znamya Truda go through and Chertanovo go home, 0‑1 the scoreline that did it. The dressing room will call the league the priority now, because that is what dressing rooms say.
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.
4 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Chertanovo can tell you which week it ends in.
Squad24 Aug 2026
Ivan Polyakov 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.
Yves-Pulumde Nikiéma 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.
9 signings in three months. Every one of them may be an upgrade and the team can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild that never appears in the transfer-window verdicts.
Squad24 Aug 2026
The manager has not finished forgetting Mark Pereverzev'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.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Kirill Nikolaev has just signed for Chertanovo, and for once the answer mattered.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Chertanovo this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 20-year-old it feels ownership of. Dmitry Kondrashov 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.
48 months left and silence from upstairs — no offer, no talks, nothing for his people to answer. Clubs that let a calendar do their negotiating usually end up negotiating with the calendar.
Squad10 Aug 2026
Words at Chertanovo training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Raimundo Álvarez 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.
He is 20, and nobody at Chertanovo signed him for this season. Deals like this are judged in four years, by people who may not still be in the building.