Marked for Alvis Gabovs
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market25 Dec 2028
“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 The request is on a desk at Skonto, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad25 Dec 2028
Tempers go at Skonto
Alvis Ciganovs 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.
Squad25 Dec 2028
Chovanie Amatkarijo 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.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad17 Jul 2028
Alvis Ciganovs damages knee ligaments — 107 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 107 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.
Squad17 Jul 2028
Alvis Gabovs: that is not what I was promised
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Skonto have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Market17 Jul 2028
Skonto say no — this time
The offer from Ventspils for Janis Jagodinskis 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.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad12 Jun 2028
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Skonto may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Market12 Jun 2028
“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 The request is on a desk at Skonto, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad12 Jun 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Skonto this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Match10 Jun 2028
2‑3 to Ventspils, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
Squad12 Jun 2028
Nicolás Ferreyra 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.
Squad12 Jun 2028
“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.
Market12 Jun 2028
Add another name to the list: Ventspils have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Janis Jagodinskis. The answer from Skonto has not changed — yet.
Player ratings12 Jun 2028
Marked 8.35. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Skonto.
Player ratings12 Jun 2028
A performance of 8.01 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match27 May 2028
Still nobody has beaten Skonto
The unbeaten run reaches 10. Some of them were wins and some were escapes, but a side that refuses to lose is a side other dressing rooms talk about.
Market29 May 2028
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Vladimirs Cauna will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Skonto the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad29 May 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Skonto this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad29 May 2028
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Alvis Gabovs commits to Skonto for another 3 years.
Squad29 May 2028
Words at Skonto training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Chovanie Amatkarijo 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.
Player ratings29 May 2028
Marked 7.65 on an afternoon he ran from the first whistle to the last. Whatever else went wrong, Skonto had the best player on the pitch.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Player ratings3 Apr 2028
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.
Market3 Apr 2028
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Skonto is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad3 Apr 2028
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Skonto this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad3 Apr 2028
Nicolás Ferreyra 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.
Market3 Apr 2028
Mihkel Ainsalu is free to find somewhere else
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Skonto has been clear about where Mihkel Ainsalu stands, which is more than many ever get.
Squad3 Apr 2028
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.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Player ratings27 Mar 2028
Successful dribbles: 37. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad27 Mar 2028
A knee injury of the worst kind for Roberts Stolcers
18 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Skonto lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Squad27 Mar 2028
Tempers go at Skonto
Alvis Ciganovs 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.
Squad27 Mar 2028
Words at Skonto training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Igors Bulvitis 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.
Match25 Mar 2028
It finished 1‑0, and it was Donatas Dapkus’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Skonto.
Squad27 Mar 2028
“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.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad24 May 2027
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 50 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Player ratings24 May 2027
2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 7.94, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.
Squad24 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 Skonto this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad24 May 2027
“The easiest signature of my career.” Alvis Gabovs and Skonto agree another 4 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Match22 May 2027
Metta/LU made Skonto work for it, but the scoreboard read 2‑1 at the end and the table does not ask how.
The terraces24 May 2027
Skonto supporters have found a favourite in Bruno Melnis
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Bruno Melnis has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
Player ratings24 May 2027
Bruno Melnis was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.22. 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.
Squad24 May 2027
A player who expected to start watched it instead. The manager will call it a decision for the team; Donatas Dapkus will call it something else in private.
Player ratings24 May 2027
Successful dribbles: 10. 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
Upbeat
Squad5 Apr 2027
A fracture rules Mihkel Ainsalu out for 103 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Skonto will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Match5 Apr 2027
Skonto up to position 2
8 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
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Skonto this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad5 Apr 2027
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Noah Salau commits to Skonto for another 3 years.
Player ratings5 Apr 2027
Chances created: 15. 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.
The terraces5 Apr 2027
Skonto supporters have found a favourite in Alvis Gabovs
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 22-year-old it feels ownership of. Alvis Gabovs has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
Match3 Apr 2027
A 2‑0 win over Metta/LU, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Player ratings5 Apr 2027
A performance of 8.18 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
Player ratings5 Apr 2027
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.00, and no argument anywhere in the ground.