Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Khazar will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Khazar this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
6 goals in one match, Mehmet Sahin on the scoresheet, and a scoreline that will look like a misprint. Neutrals could not have asked more of Khazar and Gabala.
9 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere else.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Khazar will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 9.91 at 34, and nobody on the pitch was better.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 7 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
5 wins on the spin now, and the question has changed from whether the run ends to who ends it. Confidence like this cannot be bought; it has to be earned exactly this way.
9 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Khazar and Inter in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
The words a physio says slowly. 39 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.
96 minutes played. Vincent Aboubakar found the finish in time that only existed because of earlier delays, and AZAL went from a point to nothing inside one movement.
Player ratings2 Nov 2026
A brace, and Tugra Turhan takes the afternoon — 8.31
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Tugra Turhan provided it, and the 8.31 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Neftchi have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Neftchi this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Khazar will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Samir Medvedev will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Khazar the goodbyes have quietly begun.
He will play here until the summer and then walk out of the door for free, having already signed elsewhere. Supporters will manage the first part of that sentence; it is the second they will struggle with.
Enrico Bruno 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.
Squad28 Sep 2026
Words at Khazar training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Ruslan Sadygov 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.