Marked for Vladislav Plotnikov
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Boardroom19 Mar 2029
Pressure builds in the Zenit Penza boardroom
The directors have stopped offering the manager public warmth. In football that is usually the stage before the short statement.
Market19 Mar 2029
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Zenit Penza can pretend not to have heard.
The dugout19 Mar 2029
news_b_frozen_out_of_the_side
Squad19 Mar 2029
Danil Pshenichnikov and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad19 Mar 2029
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Evgeny Yegorov was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout19 Mar 2029
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Zenit Penza told Vladislav Plotnikov something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
Market19 Mar 2029
Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Evgeny Yegorov’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.
Market19 Mar 2029
Zenit Penza have let the market know Danil Pshenichnikov can be had. No price in the advert, but everyone in the trade knows roughly what it says.
Market19 Mar 2029
5 months remain and no agreement is close. Every week without a signature costs Zenit Penza money.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match2 Dec 2028
10 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
Match2 Dec 2028
The goals have deserted Zenit Penza
10 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Zenit Penza can tell you which week it ends in.
Boardroom4 Dec 2028
The board’s statement ran to three sentences and one of them mentioned results. Mikhail Agafonov has managed long enough to translate: win soon, or the next statement is shorter.
Match2 Dec 2028
0‑3 against Ryazan, and no complaints that would survive the replay. The manager spoke about character afterwards; the terraces used shorter words.
Boardroom4 Dec 2028
The official line will be that it was routine. It was not routine, the timing says so, and every person in that room knows what the next bad result costs.
Market4 Dec 2028
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Zenit Penza can pretend not to have heard.
Squad4 Dec 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 Zenit Penza this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Boardroom4 Dec 2028
$85.4K of the owner's money at Zenit Penza
The shortfall was covered from upstairs again. Supporters are entitled to be relieved and entitled to ask what happens the month it is not, and both feelings usually arrive together.
Squad4 Dec 2028
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Evgeny Yegorov was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match4 Nov 2028
0‑4 against Dinamo St Petersburg, and no complaints that would survive the replay. The manager spoke about character afterwards; the terraces used shorter words.
Boardroom6 Nov 2028
Mikhail Agafonov has until the next board meeting
What was said behind closed doors has now been said in front of a microphone. Everybody at Zenit Penza can do the arithmetic, including the man it is aimed at.
Boardroom6 Nov 2028
The official line will be that it was routine. It was not routine, the timing says so, and every person in that room knows what the next bad result costs.
Match4 Nov 2028
No end in sight to Zenit Penza's wait for a win
7 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Zenit Penza has to find a result from somewhere.
Match4 Nov 2028
7 games without scoring. Strikers stop looking up, midfielders take the extra touch, and every shot that clears the bar is followed by a groan that has been building since the last goal.
Market6 Nov 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 Zenit Penza, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad6 Nov 2028
Artem Antonov and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Boardroom6 Nov 2028
$47.3K of the owner's money at Zenit Penza
The shortfall was covered from upstairs again. Supporters are entitled to be relieved and entitled to ask what happens the month it is not, and both feelings usually arrive together.
Boardroom6 Nov 2028
Wages eat 143% of everything Zenit Penza 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.