Marked for Dmitriy Matveev
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Boardroom19 Apr 2032
Pressure builds in the Angusht boardroom
The directors have stopped offering the manager public warmth. In football that is usually the stage before the short statement.
Match19 Apr 2032
Every point is an argument now for Angusht
Position 12 and 10 points, and the table gets read bottom-up in this part of town. The calendar has stopped being a schedule and started being a countdown.
Market19 Apr 2032
“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.
Squad19 Apr 2032
Vladislav Drozd 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.
Boardroom19 Apr 2032
152% of the income goes out in wages at Angusht
Every club in football pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time somebody has tried it.
Squad19 Apr 2032
Words at Angusht training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Pavel Putin 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.
The dugout19 Apr 2032
Boris Bely asks for a word with the manager
“I would rather say it to his face than read about it.” The meeting was requested by the player, which tells you most of what you need to know.
Market19 Apr 2032
Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Danil Kazantsev’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.
Market19 Apr 2032
The clock does Lorenzo Crepaldi’s negotiating for him
3 months left, and both sides know what that means: every week without a signature, the fee Angusht could ask drops and the wages Lorenzo Crepaldi can ask rise.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad8 Mar 2032
22 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Angusht lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Boardroom8 Mar 2032
Interim Coach has until the next board meeting
What was said behind closed doors has now been said in front of a microphone. Everybody at Angusht can do the arithmetic, including the man it is aimed at.
Market8 Mar 2032
“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.
Squad8 Mar 2032
Vitaly Nem 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 Angusht this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The dugout8 Mar 2032
news_b_frozen_out_of_the_side
Boardroom8 Mar 2032
$239.2K of the owner's money at Angusht
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.
Boardroom8 Mar 2032
No signings allowed at Angusht
The manager may talk to whoever he likes and may pay nobody. A squad survives a window like this by borrowing, by promoting, and by hoping the injuries land somewhere else.
The dugout8 Mar 2032
The manager's exit leaves Vladislav Drozd exposed
Every squad has men who were signed by a particular manager and men who were merely inherited. Vladislav Drozd is in the first group, and the man who wanted him here is no longer in the building.
Squad8 Mar 2032
Words at Angusht training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Pavel Putin 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.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad1 Mar 2032
Mikhail Mikaelyan damages knee ligaments — 29 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 29 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Market1 Mar 2032
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Angusht they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Market1 Mar 2032
Georgy Rodin hands in a written request
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Angusht can pretend not to have heard.
Boardroom1 Mar 2032
Angusht close the window on a squad of their own making
3 in and 3 out, and no more changes for months. The manager has what he has, the supporters have their opinion of it, and the table will have the last word.
Boardroom1 Mar 2032
He will play here until the summer and then walk out of the door for free, having already signed elsewhere. Supporters will manage the first part of that sentence; it is the second they will struggle with.
The dugout1 Mar 2032
news_b_frozen_out_of_the_side
Squad1 Mar 2032
Vladislav Drozd 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.
Transfer targets1 Mar 2032
Angusht asked and Leningradets said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Squad1 Mar 2032
Words at Angusht training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Lorenzo Crepaldi 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.