Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Ivan Abdulov will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Rodina the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Artem Biryukov and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad25 Apr 2033
Words at Rodina training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Juande Rivas 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.
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Federico Magro is on it.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Rodina is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Dmitry Markitesov 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.
Squad11 Apr 2033
Words at Rodina training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Leo Goglichidze 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.
“I watch every Rodina game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Rodina M runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
Every manager keeps a short list in his head of the men he wants on the pitch when the stakes rise, and it is never published. The team sheets for the big afternoons say Tamaz Topuria is on it.
In brief
The dugoutToby Vanaken asks for a word with the manager
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Rodina is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
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.
At 36, 3 points below where he was, and a body that has started charging interest. It happens to all of them and it is still the hardest paragraph on this page.
Nobody at Rodina 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.
19 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Rodina lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Position 2, 53 points, and the result everyone checks first is now theirs. The word is still not being said around the ground, which is how you know everyone is thinking it.
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Rodina people have started saying his name in the past tense.
Player ratings28 Feb 2033
Toby Vanaken, 20, plays like he has been here for years — 7.76
A mark of 7.76 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 20-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Diego Dufort is living that version at Rodina, and it tends to show in the first month.
This is not rotation. Denis Tikhonov has not been in the manager's plans for some time, and nobody at Rodina is pretending otherwise.
Boardroom28 Feb 2033
Rodina close the window on a squad of their own making
3 in and 9 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.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Rodina have done the hard part with Zenit, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
26 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Rodina lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
The offer from Tver for Andrei Chugunov was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
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 offer went to Zenit this week and it is theirs to answer. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loud the door closes.
Dmitry Markitesov 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.
Squad21 Feb 2033
Words at Rodina training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Magomedkhabib Abdusalamov 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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. CSKA Moscow have kept their man, and Rodina go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
2 goals to the good, and then a slow surrender of everything that had been earned. Dmitry Markitesov will not be the one blamed for it, but nobody at Rodina escapes the conversation that follows a collapse like this.
Dmitry Markitesov 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.
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.
Every run ends on an afternoon somebody had marked down as routine. This one went 5 matches, which is long enough that a town had stopped counting, and short enough that it will remember exactly who stopped it.
Marked 8.19 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
It needed Dmitry Markitesov to find the net to bring anything home at all: 2‑2 against Arsenal Tula, and half the dressing room will call it a point won.
4‑0, and Toby Vanaken took the headlines on an afternoon when everything Rodina tried came off. Days like this are retold all winter.
Player ratings27 Dec 2032
A brace, and Toby Vanaken takes the afternoon — 8.75
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Toby Vanaken provided it, and the 8.75 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
The hardest thing about being 17 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Ivan Abdulov did not need any: 7.84, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Dmitry Markitesov 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.
Squad27 Dec 2032
Words at Rodina training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Leo Goglichidze 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.
2 goals before the ground had finished arriving. Baltika 2 spent the rest of the afternoon playing a match that had already been decided, and everybody in the stadium knew it.
Marked 8.09 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Rodina have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Rodina is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Artem Biryukov 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Magomedkhabib Abdusalamov was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 17-year-old it feels ownership of. Ivan Abdulov has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
5 signings in three months. Every one of them may be an upgrade and the team can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild that never appears in the transfer-window verdicts.
The dugout20 Dec 2032
The view from the dugout
“We controlled it. There were spells I did not like and we will look at them, but the group showed me something.” Gleb Bondarenko, on a 3‑2 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 6 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Rodina this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
Ufa will keep picking him until June and will get nothing for him after it. Fedor Bondar has pre-agreed a move to Rodina, and the only people who lose in that arrangement are the ones who let the contract run down.
The board have answered with money instead of encouragement, which is the only answer a manager ever wants. Spending it well is now entirely his problem.
“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.
Player ratings18 Oct 2032
A brace, and Tamaz Topuria takes the afternoon — 8.00
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Tamaz Topuria provided it, and the 8.00 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Rodina is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
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 paperwork is done long before the player is. Artem Chaly has agreed terms to come here when his current deal runs out, which means Rodina have spent a summer's transfer budget on a phone call.
He is 17 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.
In brief
Player ratingsNinety minutes of Yegor Ponomarev at his very best
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Rodina can pretend not to have heard.
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Rodina people have started saying his name in the past tense.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Rodina they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Nobody makes a documentary about a hamstring and everybody in the game fears one. Rodina will be careful with the return date, because the second one is always worse than the first.
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at CSKA Moscow is saying, and nobody at Rodina is enjoying the guessing.
Dmitry Markitesov 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.
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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Dinamo Moscow have kept their man, and Rodina go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
The phone has started ringing about Ivan Abdulov again, and this time the name on the line is Kvant. Rodina are listening politely and promising nothing.
“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 Rodina, and it is not being withdrawn.
The hardest thing about being 19 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Toby Vanaken did not need any: 7.67, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Rodina have done the hard part with Dinamo Moscow, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Rodina they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Rodina asked and Dinamo Moscow said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
At 19 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
Successful dribbles: 30. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Rodina they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: Dinamo Moscow keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
$440.0K was the most the club would pay and Zenit were asking for more. Deals like this are revived in the last week of a window roughly half the time, and everybody involved knows it.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Rodina this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad16 Aug 2032
Words at Rodina training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Magomedkhabib Abdusalamov 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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Dinamo Moscow have kept their man, and Rodina go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
1‑4 against Dinamo Moscow 2, and no complaints that would survive the replay. The manager spoke about character afterwards; the terraces used shorter words.
The deal with Dinamo Moscow is done in every sense but the one that puts him on the pitch. Nothing goes wrong at this stage, except on the occasions when it does.
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at CSKA Moscow is saying, and nobody at Rodina is enjoying the guessing.
Rodina have gone to Baltika with a bid, and the supporters have gone to the internet with an opinion about it. Whether either changes anything is up to the selling club.
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Rodina can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Magomedkhabib Abdusalamov was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Rodina asked and CSKA Moscow said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Rodina is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Rodina this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad24 May 2032
Words at Rodina training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Arseny Lomtev 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.
Nobody at Rodina 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.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Danila Yanov trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Magomedkhabib Abdusalamov signs something — a contract at Rodina or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
72 points from position 4. The title is somebody else’s business and the drop is somebody else’s problem; what is left is the argument about passports.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Rodina is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
The hardest thing about being 19 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Toby Vanaken did not need any: 7.86, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
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.
Dmitry Markitesov 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.
He is 19 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.
3 straight away victories. Sides that win away are usually sides that can defend and can counter, and the table has begun to reflect what those journeys have earned.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Arseny Lomtev was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“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 Rodina, and it is not being withdrawn.
The offer from Irkutsk for Timur Kuznetsov was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Rodina have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Everything agreed with CSKA Moscow, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
Successful dribbles: 23. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 4 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
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.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Rodina have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Rodina they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Defending was optional and nobody took up the option. 8 goals between Rodina and Ufa, and not one of the people who paid to be there will ask for the money back.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Leo Goglichidze was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Denis Tikhonov wins it after the whistle should have gone
92 minutes played. Denis Tikhonov found the finish in time that only existed because of earlier delays, and Fakel went from a point to nothing inside one movement.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Rodina is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Rodina have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Rodina this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
A 3‑2 win over Fakel, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Squad1 Dec 2031
Words at Rodina training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Leo Goglichidze 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.
At 16 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
In brief
The dugoutThe manager makes an example of Andrey Savin
Player ratingsNinety minutes of Vadim Rassadin at his very best
Player ratingsDenis Tikhonov was on a different afternoon to everybody else
Arsenal Tula will want this one forgotten quickly: 4‑0, every duel lost, and a long ride home. Rodina were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.
3 goals in one game. The first was taken well, the second was taken greedily, and by the third the crowd were simply waiting for him to get the ball.
The terraces24 Nov 2031
A cup hiding at Sochi leaves Rodina explaining themselves
1-4, and long before the end the away end had switched from encouragement to something considerably more pointed. Nobody rings a phone-in about losing narrowly.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Rodina can pretend not to have heard.
Centre-halves are allowed forward twice a season and are judged on what they do when they get there. Artem Biryukov scored, was marked 7.82, and got back before anybody noticed he had gone.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Matvey Belentjev will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Rodina the goodbyes have quietly begun.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Rodina have lost him in all but the paperwork.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Rodina can pretend not to have heard.
Rodina asked and Zenit said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Artem Biryukov 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.
Marked 6.81 on 14 actions at both ends of the pitch. Midfielders like this get described as unspectacular by people who have never tried to play against one.
The name of Matvey Belentjev has come up in conversations Rodina were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Everybody at Rodina saw it before anybody said it, which is how this always goes. At 34 the decline is real and measurable — 3 points — and the only question left is how the club handles somebody it owes a great deal to.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Gadjimagomed Khalilulaev was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
In brief
Transfer targetsA loan move for Ivan Lepskiy is in the works