Marked for Dmitriy Balabanov
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market10 Apr 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 Murom can pretend not to have heard.
Market10 Apr 2028
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Murom they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad10 Apr 2028
Words exchanged at Murom
Denis Faizullin 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.
Squad10 Apr 2028
Gadjimurad Abdullaev 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 dugout10 Apr 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.
Market10 Apr 2028
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Murom know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match17 Jul 2027
Murom strike at the death to beat Kaluga
There were 88 minutes on the clock and Kaluga had all but banked the point. Football rarely reads the room, and Murom did not stop to explain themselves.
The dugout19 Jul 2027
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Murom may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Market19 Jul 2027
Cherepovets come back empty-handed
The bid was some way short and Murom did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Squad19 Jul 2027
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Murom this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Boardroom19 Jul 2027
5 academy graduates step up at Murom
Senior shirt numbers handed to boys the coaches have known since they were twelve. Most will not make it and all of them have already done the hard part.
Boardroom19 Jul 2027
Belts tighten at Murom
The accounts are being read more closely than the results. Wages before ambition is the order of business now, and the manager has been told so.
Transfer targets19 Jul 2027
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Chaika have kept their man, and Murom go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Squad19 Jul 2027
Philipp Dvoretskov 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 terraces19 Jul 2027
He is 23 and the ground already sings his name, which is a thing that happens to local boys and almost never to signings. Everything from here is measured against an affection he did nothing to earn except be from here.