The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Akhmat people have started saying his name in the past tense.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Akhmat can pretend not to have heard.
Arsen Adamov 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.
Akhmat asked and Famalicao 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 system has changed and his position has not. A footballer can improve his form; he cannot improve the manager’s formation, and that is the whole of the problem.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Konstantin Reshetnikov after 1‑2, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer 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 The request is on a desk at Akhmat, and it is not being withdrawn.
Two goals and a mark of 8.57 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Akhmat people have started saying his name in the past tense.
Every long career reaches the week the last one is thought about. He would like it to be where he started, and Akhmat know now that the thought has arrived.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 7 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Rasul Mitsaev will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Akhmat the goodbyes have quietly begun.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Akhmat this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
11 combined actions and 6.23. 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.
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 1‑2, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
4 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Akhmat this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The dugout14 Dec 2026
The manager’s verdict
“That is on me. I pick the team and I picked wrong.” Managers say that when they mean it and when they need to be seen to, and after 0‑2 Konstantin Reshetnikov left the room before anybody could ask which.
Nobody at Akhmat 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.
Dinamo Makhachkala next, and one man in the Akhmat dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought of him.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Akhmat they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
10 points at the turn. The first half of a season is a promise; the second is a bill, and the town is about to find out which of the two this one was.
The dugout30 Nov 2026
The manager has not finished forgetting Lechi Sadulaev's mistake
Publicly it is behind everybody. It is not behind the man who picks the team, and the only place that shows is a team sheet. He will get another chance; he will get it in a match that matters less.
“I did not go to Saturn to sit and watch. I want to come back to Akhmat and fight for my place.” 3 appearances in 14 matches say the rest.
The dugout30 Nov 2026
The manager’s verdict
“That is on me. I pick the team and I picked wrong.” Managers say that when they mean it and when they need to be seen to, and after 0‑1 Konstantin Reshetnikov left the room before anybody could ask which.
Arsen Adamov 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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 22-year-old it feels ownership of. Abakar Gadjiev 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.
Successful dribbles: 17. 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 supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 0‑2, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Egas Cacintura trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Arsen Adamov 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.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Kirill Schetinin’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Akhmat needing him to play as if none of it matters.
Nobody at Akhmat 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.
A conversation in the manager’s office, and a commitment that came out of it. Promises like that are cheap to make and expensive to break, and Ilja Svinov has written the date down.
In brief
The dugoutAbakar Gadjiev asks for a word with the manager
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
The dugout9 Nov 2026
The manager’s verdict
“That is on me. I pick the team and I picked wrong.” Managers say that when they mean it and when they need to be seen to, and after 0‑1 Konstantin Reshetnikov left the room before anybody could ask which.
Successful dribbles: 14. 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.
Nobody at Akhmat 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 Galymzhan Kenzhebek trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Mohamed Konaté wins it after the whistle should have gone
91 minutes played. Mohamed Konaté found the finish in time that only existed because of earlier delays, and Orenburg went from a point to nothing inside one movement.
Two goals and a mark of 8.79 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
7.76, 1 on the scoresheet, and the specific comedy of a back-four player celebrating like somebody who does this every week. He does not, and that is exactly why the ground reacted the way it did.
Arsen Adamov 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.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 22 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
The dugout19 Oct 2026
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.” Konstantin Reshetnikov, on a 3‑2 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.
Egas Cacintura 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.
Successful dribbles: 18. 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.
“We earned that. I asked them for a reaction and I got one, and now I want the same again on Saturday.” Konstantin Reshetnikov on a 1‑0 afternoon that pleased him more than he was prepared to show.
The shape wanted a different profile against this opponent, which is a real football answer and no comfort at all to the man it is about. He did nothing wrong and he did not play.
A conversation in the manager’s office, and a commitment that came out of it. Promises like that are cheap to make and expensive to break, and Klisman Cake has written the date down.
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 last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Akhmat have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Egas Cacintura 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.
A 1‑1 draw with Krylya Sovetov leaves the dressing room somewhere between relief and regret.
The dugout21 Sep 2026
The manager’s verdict
“I am frustrated, honestly. We did enough to win and we did not win.” Konstantin Reshetnikov was not hiding it after 1‑1, and nobody in the Akhmat dressing room was either.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Valery Tsarukyan’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Akhmat needing him to play as if none of it matters.
Ninety specific minutes wanted a different sort of player, and the manager picked one. He is not out of form and he is not in the side, and both are true.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Akhmat can pretend not to have heard.
5 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 offer from Akron for Vadim Uljanov 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.
$700.0K was the most the club would pay and Akron 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.
Arsen Adamov 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.