Marked for Maksim Ismayilov
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad3 Apr 2028
Tempers go at Khazar
Cəlal Hüseynov 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 Apr 2028
Sebastián Sanabria 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.
Squad3 Apr 2028
It will be explained as a change for the team and it may even be one. Nobody who has worn one believes that, and neither does the man who has just had it taken away.
The dugout3 Apr 2028
Cəlal Hüseynov 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 Cəlal Hüseynov trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Squad3 Apr 2028
The demotion a club never announces and a dressing room always notices. Emre Dervisoglu is further from the side than he was, and the reason will not be given until he asks.
The dugout3 Apr 2028
Vugar Ramazanov has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at Khazar will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
Market3 Apr 2028
Talks stall between Khazar and Bruno
“We are a long way apart, and pretending otherwise helps nobody.” Neither side is close, and the calendar is not on the club's side.
Market3 Apr 2028
The name of Vüqar Mustafayev keeps appearing in other people's back pages. Khazar say nothing, which says plenty.
The dugout3 Apr 2028
A conversation in the manager’s office, and a commitment that came out of it. Promises like that are cheap to make and expensive to break, and Vüqar Mustafayev has written the date down.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad27 Mar 2028
A falling-out at Khazar
Shahriyar Garayev and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad27 Mar 2028
A row about effort at Khazar
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Cəlal Hüseynov was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Squad27 Mar 2028
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and Khazar know it.
The dugout27 Mar 2028
“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.
Market27 Mar 2028
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Rufat Guseynov signs something — a contract at Khazar or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
The dugout27 Mar 2028
Nothing in writing and nothing in public: a word about playing time, given face to face at Khazar. The team sheets over the next month will show whether it was worth having.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market14 Feb 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 Khazar, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad14 Feb 2028
Tempers go at Khazar
Shahriyar Garayev 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.
Squad14 Feb 2028
At 19 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.
Squad14 Feb 2028
A row about effort at Khazar
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Cəlal Hüseynov was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Transfer targets14 Feb 2028
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.
The dugout14 Feb 2028
The manager makes an example of Mahir Guseynov
“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.
Squad14 Feb 2028
“The easiest signature of my career.” Fabián Borges and Khazar agree another 3 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Market14 Feb 2028
Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Maksim Amirguliyev’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.
The dugout14 Feb 2028
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Wilman Moreira is on it.