Marked for Mathieu Giraud
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Match31 May 2027
Amkar are in among the leaders
Position 2 and 45 points on the board. Nobody at the ground will say the word out loud yet, and everybody at the ground is thinking it.
Squad31 May 2027
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Amkar this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad31 May 2027
Words at Amkar training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Maxim Novikov 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.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Match3 May 2027
Amkar up to position 2
45 points on the board and a place in the leading group. Nobody at the ground is saying the word out loud yet.
Squad3 May 2027
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Amkar this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad3 May 2027
Alex Matsukatov 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
Upbeat
Match5 Apr 2027
Amkar up to position 2
45 points on the board and a place in the leading group. Nobody at the ground is saying the word out loud yet.
Squad5 Apr 2027
Tempers go at Amkar
Grigory Zhilkin 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 Apr 2027
Words at Amkar training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Alex Matsukatov 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.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Player ratings23 Nov 2026
Successful dribbles: 51. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Match18 Nov 2026
Amkar bow out of the cup
Dinamo Moscow go through and Amkar 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 terraces23 Nov 2026
A cup hiding at Dinamo Moscow leaves Amkar 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.
Squad23 Nov 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 Amkar this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Match21 Nov 2026
Amkar get the job done against Ural 2
A 1‑0 win over Ural 2, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Player ratings23 Nov 2026
Marked 8.17 — 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.
Boardroom23 Nov 2026
Nobody left the Amkar 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.
Squad23 Nov 2026
Words at Amkar training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Aleksa Stanisavljevic 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.
Squad23 Nov 2026
The manager makes an example of Mathieu Giraud
“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.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Match21 Sep 2026
Amkar up to position 3
15 points on the board and a place in the leading group. Nobody at the ground is saying the word out loud yet.
Squad21 Sep 2026
Tempers go at Amkar
Alex Matsukatov 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.
Match19 Sep 2026
It finished 1‑0, and it was Nikita Goldobin’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Amkar.
Player ratings21 Sep 2026
A performance of 8.34 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
Squad21 Sep 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.
Squad21 Sep 2026
The manager makes an example of Mathieu Giraud
“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
Nikita Khvat dropped after a run of poor form
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.
Player ratings21 Sep 2026
Chances created: 6. Not on the scoresheet and not remotely anonymous — a passing performance that pulled a defence apart without leaving a mark on the column that gets read.
Player ratings21 Sep 2026
Successful dribbles: 7. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad10 Aug 2026
A move Denis Davydov would have made for nothing
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Denis Davydov is living that version at Amkar, and it tends to show in the first month.
Player ratings10 Aug 2026
Successful dribbles: 26. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad10 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 Amkar this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad10 Aug 2026
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Mathieu Giraud commits to Amkar for another 2 years.
Market10 Aug 2026
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Amkar, another week without a signature from Daniil Agureev.
Market10 Aug 2026
He is 20, and nobody at Amkar signed him for this season. Deals like this are judged in four years, by people who may not still be in the building.
Market10 Aug 2026
He is 14, and the scouting reports agree on the only line that matters: the ceiling. Signings like this are lottery tickets written by professionals.
Market10 Aug 2026
Andrey Ivanov is 14, and Amkar 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.
Player ratings10 Aug 2026
7.31, and no serious argument from anybody who was there. Amkar had eleven men on the pitch and one of them decided how it went.