The Fakel Courier
Player ratings10 Aug 2026
Nikolay Giorgobiani runs at them all day
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.
Squad10 Aug 2026
Darko Todorović 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 Fakel this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Transfer targets10 Aug 2026
Door shut on Roberto Fernández
Fakel asked and Akron said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Market10 Aug 2026
One of our own: Platon Gorbachev joins the Fakel first team
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Platon Gorbachev is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Market10 Aug 2026
One of our own: Oleg Volkov joins the Fakel first team
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Oleg Volkov is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Market10 Aug 2026
Fakel promote Pyotr Pluzhnikov from within
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Pyotr Pluzhnikov has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
Market10 Aug 2026
Ivan Vasin steps up from the Fakel academy
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Ivan Vasin has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
Squad10 Aug 2026
No place for Kirill Danilin in the new shape
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation Fakel are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.
Squad10 Aug 2026
7 new faces, and Fakel are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
In brief
- Transfer targets Fakel ask about Nikita Saltykov
- Transfer targets A loan move for Fran Topić is in the works
- Squad A row about effort at Fakel