It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at CSKA 1948 this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
The shape wanted a different profile against this opponent, which is a real football answer and no comfort at all to the man it is about. He did nothing wrong and he did not play.
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.
In brief
MarketThe window shut and Benaissa Benamar is still in the building
“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.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Words at NK Domzale training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Kevin Stojanovic 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.
8 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.
In brief
Loan watchThe goals keep arriving from Robert Lovric’s exile
There is no crueller way to lose a football match. CSKA 1948 scored in the 90th minute, the restart barely happened, and the away end was still standing when the whistle went.
Player ratings7 Sep 2026
A brace, and Robert Lovric takes the afternoon — 8.12
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Robert Lovric provided it, and the 8.12 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
“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 The request is on a desk at CSKA 1948, and it is not being withdrawn.
Yohann Magnin 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.
At 23 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.
There is a level at which a footballer stops being tested and starts being contained, and he reached it some time ago. CSKA 1948 know it, and so does everybody who watches him.
“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 CSKA 1948, and it is not being withdrawn.
Yohann Magnin 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 offer from Ludogorets for Berna was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
The name of Lasha Dvali has come up in conversations CSKA 1948 were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at CSKA 1948 this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Marked 8.03 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
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. CSKA 1948 will not keep him by pretending otherwise.
There is no complaint available here and everybody involved knows it, which does not make the walk to the bench any shorter. Form is the only currency in football that cannot be borrowed against.
In brief
Player ratingsOff the bench and decisive: Robert Lovric
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Bojan Simunovic provided it, and the 9.15 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at NK Domzale this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
Nikolai Merzlyakov 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 phone has started ringing about Robert Lovric again, and this time the name on the line is CSKA 1948. NK Domzale are listening politely and promising nothing.
1‑2 to NK Krsko, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Words at NK Domzale training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Kevin Lovric 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.
Boardroom3 Aug 2026
Nobody left the NK Domzale 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.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at NK Domzale, and both men came out saying it was fine.
He wheeled away like a man who had been carrying it for months, because he had. NK Domzale have their signing off the mark and one press-conference question retired.