Marked for Agil Huseynov
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad18 Jan 2027
166 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Inter lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Market18 Jan 2027
Inter get their man
The chase for Agil Huseynov ended with $110.0K changing hands and Ravan out of reasons to say no. The supporters will judge the fee the only way that matters: on Saturdays.
Squad18 Jan 2027
Tempers go at Inter
Ayaz Guliev 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.
Squad18 Jan 2027
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Angelo Rovegno commits to Inter for another 3 years.
Transfer targets18 Jan 2027
The approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.
Squad18 Jan 2027
Words at Inter training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Angelo Rovegno 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.
Transfer targets18 Jan 2027
Gabala have been asked whether they would lend him. Loans are agreed quickly or not at all, and this one will be one or the other by the weekend.
Transfer targets18 Jan 2027
A loan enquiry to Gabala: cover, or a look at somebody the club cannot afford to buy yet. Either way the answer will come back inside the week.
The dugout18 Jan 2027
“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.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad18 Jan 2027
137 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Ravan lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Match18 Jan 2027
Every point is an argument now for Ravan
Position 9 and 7 points, and the table gets read bottom-up in this part of town. The calendar has stopped being a schedule and started being a countdown.
Transfer targets18 Jan 2027
Everything agreed with Zira, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
Transfer targets18 Jan 2027
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: Cruzeiro keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
Squad18 Jan 2027
Tempers go at Ravan
Salim Hashimov 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.
Market18 Jan 2027
Agil Huseynov has left for Inter in a $110.0K deal. The accountants are pleased; the supporters are less certain.
Squad18 Jan 2027
Samuel Lobato 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.
Transfer targets18 Jan 2027
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Neftchi have kept their man, and Ravan go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Market18 Jan 2027
He is doing his job and he is not settling. Ravan were supposed to be a step up in his own reckoning, and his own reckoning has been adjusted since he arrived.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market11 Jan 2027
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and AZAL waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Inter is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
Market11 Jan 2027
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Inter can pretend not to have heard.
Squad11 Jan 2027
Loris Armati gets the move he always wanted
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Loris Armati has just signed for Inter, and for once the answer mattered.
Transfer targets11 Jan 2027
The deal with Ravan is done in every sense but the one that puts him on the pitch. Nothing goes wrong at this stage, except on the occasions when it does.
Squad11 Jan 2027
Words exchanged at Inter
Rodolfo Potiguar and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Squad11 Jan 2027
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Gabriel Castillo and Inter agree another 3 years.
Squad11 Jan 2027
Ayaz Guliev 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.
The dugout11 Jan 2027
The manager makes an example of Marcus Uberaba
“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.
Market11 Jan 2027
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Inter, another week without a signature from Matty Virtue.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market11 Jan 2027
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Inter waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Ravan is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
Market11 Jan 2027
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Ravan can pretend not to have heard.
Transfer targets11 Jan 2027
The deal with Cruzeiro is done in every sense but the one that puts him on the pitch. Nothing goes wrong at this stage, except on the occasions when it does.
Transfer targets11 Jan 2027
No thanks: Həbib Hüşənov rejects the move
Ravan had done everything except persuade the man himself. He stays at Gabala, and the manager goes back to the drawing board with the money still in the bank.
Squad11 Jan 2027
Words exchanged at Ravan
Salim Hashimov and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Squad11 Jan 2027
A row about effort at Ravan
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Dragoljub Savić was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Transfer targets11 Jan 2027
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Gabala have kept their man, and Ravan go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Squad11 Jan 2027
No place for Jesse Debrah in the new shape
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation Ravan are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.
Squad11 Jan 2027
Too much change too quickly at Ravan
5 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.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match26 Dec 2026
No end in sight to Ravan's wait for a win
10 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Ravan has to find a result from somewhere.
Market28 Dec 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.
The dugout28 Dec 2026
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Ravan may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Squad28 Dec 2026
Tempers go at Ravan
Samuel Lobato 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.
Match26 Dec 2026
Ravan come up short against Kapaz
Kapaz left with the points after a 1‑3 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Squad28 Dec 2026
A row about effort at Ravan
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Dragoljub Savić was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout28 Dec 2026
The view from the dugout
“We will look at it, we will learn from it, and we go again.” The three sentences every manager keeps for a 1‑3 defeat, delivered by Renat Dadashov to a room that had heard them before.
The dugout28 Dec 2026
The manager makes an example of Afran Sheydaev
“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.
Squad28 Dec 2026
One booking too many, and Dragoljub Savić sits out. Ravan lose him for the sort of avoidable reason that makes a manager's week longer.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad5 Oct 2026
A knee injury of the worst kind for Rashad Nadirov
40 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Ravan lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Player ratings5 Oct 2026
Age has not caught Kamran Nadirov yet — 7.87
At 34 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 7.87 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Match3 Oct 2026
At last: Ravan win one
7 matches without a win, and then this, against AZAL. Relief is a strange noise in a football ground and it was the only noise at the end.
Squad5 Oct 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 Ravan this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Words at Ravan training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Dragoljub Savić 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.
Match3 Oct 2026
Ravan get the job done against AZAL
A 1‑0 win over AZAL, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Squad5 Oct 2026
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Afran Sheydaev and Ravan agree another 1 years.
The dugout5 Oct 2026
The manager’s verdict
“I am not going to get carried away and I will not let them either. It was a good day. There will be harder ones.” Renat Dadashov kept it short after the 1‑0 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.
The dugout5 Oct 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Richard Medvedev, and the manager let it.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad24 Aug 2026
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 13 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Market24 Aug 2026
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Ravan can pretend not to have heard.
Squad24 Aug 2026
A falling-out at Ravan
Maksim Amirguliyev and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Match22 Aug 2026
Agil Huseynov scored, and precious little else went right: 1‑3 to Neftchi, and a quiet walk to the dressing room.
Squad24 Aug 2026
Words at Ravan training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Timur Mamonov 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.
Transfer targets24 Aug 2026
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Neftchi have kept their man, and Ravan go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
The dugout24 Aug 2026
The manager makes an example of Agil Madatov
“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.
Squad24 Aug 2026
The medical room confirms 22 days on the sidelines for Samuel Owusu, and a plan built around him now has to be rebuilt.
The dugout24 Aug 2026
“I could talk about decisions and I could talk about luck. I will not. We lost.” The manager, 1‑3, and a press conference that lasted four minutes.