Marked for Mark Isayev
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad20 Mar 2028
Alexey Larin in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Torpedo Miass this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad20 Mar 2028
Adam Wierzbicki has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at Torpedo Miass 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.
Squad20 Mar 2028
Mark Isayev 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
Uneasy
Squad7 Feb 2028
Alexey Larin in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Torpedo Miass this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Boardroom7 Feb 2028
The accounts make uncomfortable reading. Wages first and ambition second is the order of business at Torpedo Miass now.
Boardroom7 Feb 2028
Wages eat 90% of everything Torpedo Miass earn
There is a figure at which a wage bill stops being ambitious and becomes the reason nothing else is possible, and this club has reached it. Nothing is left over for a transfer, a stand or a rainy afternoon.
Squad7 Feb 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.
Market7 Feb 2028
Druzhba are about to pick up the phone
A conversation is coming this week. Torpedo Miass will put a number on him, and from there it stops being football and becomes arithmetic.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Squad27 Dec 2027
Adam Wierzbicki 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 Dec 2027
Words at Torpedo Miass training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Mark Isayev 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.
Squad27 Dec 2027
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Artem Albastov, and the manager let it.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market25 Oct 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 Torpedo Miass can pretend not to have heard.
Squad25 Oct 2027
Alexey Larin in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Torpedo Miass this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad25 Oct 2027
Adam Wierzbicki has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at Torpedo Miass 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.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Market10 Aug 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.
Squad10 Aug 2026
Alexey Larin 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.
Match8 Aug 2026
Beaten 1‑3, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Squad10 Aug 2026
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Krystian Mucha and Torpedo Miass agree another 3 years.
Player ratings10 Aug 2026
Successful dribbles: 20. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad10 Aug 2026
The manager makes an example of Evgeny Lopatko
“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.
Market10 Aug 2026
He is 16, and nobody at Torpedo Miass 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
He is 15, and the scouting reports agree on the only line that matters: the ceiling. Signings like this are lottery tickets written by professionals.