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.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Édouard Muller is living that version at CSKA Moscow, and it tends to show in the first month.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at CSKA Moscow this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The words a physio says slowly. 52 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.
“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 The request is on a desk at Zira, and it is not being withdrawn.
The phone has started ringing about Peter Andersen again, and this time the name on the line is Kapaz. Zira are listening politely and promising nothing.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Zira is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Artem Dudarenko 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 words a physio says slowly. 59 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.
“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 The request is on a desk at Zira, and it is not being withdrawn.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Zira they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Zira have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
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 words a physio says slowly. 79 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.
“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 Zira, and it is not being withdrawn.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Zira have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Renat Nazarov is living that version at Zira, and it tends to show in the first month.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Peter Andersen will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Zira the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Artem Dudarenko 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.
Ninety minutes of very little, and then everything at once. The winner arrived in the 85th, and Gabala spent what remained of the match appealing to the referee rather than chasing the ball.
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.
A defender on the scoresheet, which happens rarely enough that everybody in the ground remembers who took the corner. 1 for him, and a mark of 7.77 for the rest of it.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Zira they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Zira this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Two goals and a mark of 8.85 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Peter Andersen will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Zira the goodbyes have quietly begun.
11 goals in one match, Domagoj Babic on the scoresheet, and a scoreline that will look like a misprint. Neutrals could not have asked more of Zira and Ravan.
He won it back and then made something of it, which is two jobs and the reason the scoreline looks the way it does. 14 combined actions and a mark of 7.91, and not one of them will make a highlights package.
Beaten 7 times, with 3 saves for company. Goalkeepers carry these scorelines on their record whoever actually caused them, which is the quiet injustice of the job.
In brief
SquadWords at Zira training over how hard people work
1‑4 to Qarabag, and it was every bit as bad as the number suggests. There are defeats you argue about and defeats you apologise for; this was the second kind.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Zira can pretend not to have heard.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Zira 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 Zira this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Shota Kiteishvili 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.
12 combined actions and 7.90. The job he did is the one that shows up as other people looking good, and the only reliable way to notice it is to watch what happens on the afternoons he is missing.
Clubs make promises constantly and the page usually only hears about them when they are broken. This one was honoured, and the dressing room noticed that faster than any supporter did.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Zira is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Player ratings23 Oct 2045
Daley Hateboer, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 7.62
A mark of 7.62 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 21-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
4 wins on the spin now, and the question has changed from whether the run ends to who ends it. Confidence like this cannot be bought; it has to be earned exactly this way.
Artem Dudarenko 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.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Shota Kiteishvili. 2‑1 against AZAL, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
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 20 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.
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.
“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 Zira, and it is not being withdrawn.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Peter Andersen will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Zira the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Artem Dudarenko 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 had been thinking. Daley Hateboer 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.
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.
Position 10 and 2 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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Zira can pretend not to have heard.
8 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.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Shota Kiteishvili provided it, and the 8.07 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Zira they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Two or more conceded in each of the last 6 matches. It is not one mistake repeating itself, which would be the easier thing to fix; it is a different one every week.
Defending was optional and nobody took up the option. 8 goals between Zira and Ravan, and not one of the people who paid to be there will ask for the money back.
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.
7 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.
The hardest thing about being 20 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Mikkel Dolberg did not need any: 7.70, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Artem Dudarenko 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.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Zira they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Zira have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Daley Hateboer 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.
Kevin Meola 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.
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.
8 boys move up, and somewhere in the building the people who coached them at twelve are quietly having the best morning of their working year. Nothing about this shows up in a result and it is why the academy exists.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Daley Hateboer 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Zira this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Mahir Dadashov 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.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Agil Amirguliyev is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Cavid Madatov is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Zira this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Position 2, 33 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 name of Peter Andersen has come up in conversations Zira were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Zira they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Zira this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Artem Dudarenko 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.