Marked for Igors Rugins
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad16 Nov 2026
Arturs Vanins breaks a bone — 68 days out
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 68 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Market16 Nov 2026
Arturs Vanins has one foot out of the door
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Spartaks they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad16 Nov 2026
Eduards Rugins 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.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad19 Oct 2026
Arturs Vanins breaks a bone — 98 days out
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 98 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Market19 Oct 2026
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Spartaks is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad19 Oct 2026
Rubén Rivas 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.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market21 Sep 2026
Arturs Vanins has one foot out of the door
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Spartaks they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Boardroom21 Sep 2026
There is no worse way to lose a footballer. Arturs Vanins 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.
Squad21 Sep 2026
Eduards Rugins 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.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match12 Aug 2026
Metta/LU bow out of the cup
Liepaja go through and Metta/LU go home, 0‑3 the scoreline that did it. The dressing room will call the league the priority now, because that is what dressing rooms say.
The terraces17 Aug 2026
A cup hiding at Liepaja leaves Metta/LU explaining themselves
0-3, and long before the end the away end had switched from encouragement to something considerably more pointed. Nobody rings a phone-in about losing narrowly.
Player ratings17 Aug 2026
Successful dribbles: 25. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad17 Aug 2026
Slaviša Bogdanović 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.
Squad17 Aug 2026
Örken Makhan 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.
Squad17 Aug 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.
Squad17 Aug 2026
This league is too small for Kevin Díaz
He is doing things on a Saturday afternoon that nobody around him can answer, which is flattering for about one season and a problem after that. Metta/LU will not keep him by pretending otherwise.
Boardroom17 Aug 2026
Nobody left the Metta/LU dressing room in a hurry
The door stayed shut a long time after the final whistle. What was said in there is between them; whether it worked is between them and Saturday.
Market17 Aug 2026
Metta/LU shop where it costs nothing
Kevin Díaz signs, and the fee column stays empty. Deals like this look small in July and clever by March — or they are never mentioned again.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market10 Aug 2026
“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.
Market10 Aug 2026
The name of Vladimirs Gabovs has come up in conversations Spartaks were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Squad10 Aug 2026
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Alvis Stolcers and Spartaks agree another 4 years.
Squad10 Aug 2026
Olegs Vanins in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Spartaks this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Boardroom10 Aug 2026
Nothing happens for months and then he simply arrives, at no cost, having signed a pre-contract while still turning out for somebody else. It is the least dramatic way to sign a footballer and frequently the shrewdest.
Squad10 Aug 2026
Eduards Rugins 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.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market3 Aug 2026
“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 Spartaks, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Eduards Rugins 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.
Squad3 Aug 2026
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Nikita Kaplenko and Spartaks agree another 2 years.
Market3 Aug 2026
Add another name to the list: Metta/LU have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Igors Rugins. The answer from Spartaks has not changed — yet.
Squad3 Aug 2026
There is a level at which a footballer stops being tested and starts being contained, and he reached it some time ago. Spartaks know it, and so does everybody who watches him.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Alvis Stolcers knocks on the manager’s door
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Alvis Stolcers trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.