Marked for Idan Luftig
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad25 Oct 2027
Vitaliy Volodko damages knee ligaments — 29 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 29 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.
Market25 Oct 2027
“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 The request is on a desk at Niva, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad25 Oct 2027
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Niva may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
In brief
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Squad
Tempers go at Niva
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Squad
Words at Niva training over how hard people work
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market19 Oct 2026
Dmitriy Galuza has one foot out of the door
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Niva they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Boardroom19 Oct 2026
There is no worse way to lose a footballer. Alexandr Voronovich has pre-agreed a move away, which means every appearance between now and June is made by a man the club can no longer sell, and somebody upstairs will be asked why the contract was allowed to get here.
Squad19 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 Niva this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad19 Oct 2026
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.
Squad19 Oct 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Ilya Sedro, and the manager let it.
Market19 Oct 2026
2 months left and the two sides are nowhere near each other. Every week this drags on takes money off what Niva could get for him.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad31 Aug 2026
Evgeniy Mashagin damages knee ligaments — 18 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 18 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.
Player ratings31 Aug 2026
At 36 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.15 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Squad31 Aug 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 Niva this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Match29 Aug 2026
Osipovichi made Niva work for it, but the scoreboard read 2‑1 at the end and the table does not ask how.
Player ratings31 Aug 2026
Dmitriy Galuza was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.24. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
Squad31 Aug 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Nikita Golovach, and the manager let it.
Market31 Aug 2026
He is 20, and nobody at Niva signed him for this season. Deals like this are judged in four years, by people who may not still be in the building.
Squad31 Aug 2026
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.
Market31 Aug 2026
“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.