The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Chornomorets have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 86 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
“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 The request is on a desk at Chornomorets, and it is not being withdrawn.
Every run ends on an afternoon somebody had marked down as routine. This one went 9 matches, which is long enough that a town had stopped counting, and short enough that it will remember exactly who stopped it.
Everything agreed with Oleksandriya, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at Dynamo Kyiv is saying, and nobody at Chornomorets is enjoying the guessing.
Maksym Andrushchenko 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.
Four paragraphs on the club website, none of them about football. The board thanked him, wished him well, and had the search under way before the page went up.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 93 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Metalist waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Chornomorets is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
“Somebody picks the team on Saturday. This week it is me, and that is as far as I have thought.” No promises were made in either direction, which is how these usually begin.
“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 The request is on a desk at Chornomorets, and it is not being withdrawn.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Chornomorets have done the hard part with Dynamo Kyiv, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 101 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Chornomorets this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Simon Lüchinger was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
6 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 last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Chornomorets have lost him in all but the paperwork.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Chornomorets will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Chornomorets can pretend not to have heard.
The clubs have shaken hands with Veres; the player has not yet. Personal terms are next, and personal terms are where more deals die than anybody prints.
“Some mornings you wake up and you are still a long way from everything you know.” It is not the football and it never was; Chornomorets are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Rukh have kept their man, and Chornomorets go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Maksym Andrushchenko 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.
“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.
Squad16 Jul 2029
Words at Chornomorets training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jason Meerstadt 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.
19 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Chornomorets lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Chornomorets will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
The name of Oleh Pushkariov has come up in conversations Chornomorets were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at Dynamo Kyiv is saying, and nobody at Chornomorets is enjoying the guessing.
Metalist paid $940.0K and Chornomorets took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Dynamo Kyiv have kept their man, and Chornomorets go back to a list with one name crossed off 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 Chornomorets this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Jason Meerstadt was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
26 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Chornomorets lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 125 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
“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 Chornomorets, and it is not being withdrawn.
A conversation is coming this week. Chornomorets will put a number on him, and from there it stops being football and becomes arithmetic.
Squad2 Jul 2029
Lee O'Connor 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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. LNZ have kept their man, and Chornomorets go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Inhulets waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Chornomorets is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Chornomorets can pretend not to have heard.
Zorya paid $87.0K and Chornomorets took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Chornomorets this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad25 Jun 2029
Words at Chornomorets training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Jason Meerstadt 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.
Chornomorets have made the call to Dynamo Kyiv. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Chornomorets has been clear about where Denys Svitiukha stands, which is more than many ever get.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Zorya waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Chornomorets is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
“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 Chornomorets, and it is not being withdrawn.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Chornomorets have done the hard part with Dynamo Kyiv, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
Squad18 Jun 2029
Words at Chornomorets training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Lee O'Connor 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. Dynamo Kyiv have kept their man, and Chornomorets go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Maksym Andrushchenko 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.
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Chornomorets has been clear about where Simon Lüchinger stands, which is more than many ever get.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Maksym Hrodzinskyi is living that version at Chornomorets, and it tends to show in the first month.
Squad11 Jun 2029
Lee O'Connor 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.
Maksym Andrushchenko 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.
He is 20, and nobody at Chornomorets signed him for this season. Deals like this are judged in four years, by people who may not still be in the building.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Chornomorets, and both men came out saying it was fine.
His past walked in ahead of him. Players who have been where he has been get a hearing in a dressing room before they have earned one, and he has it for as long as his form does.
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 Muhammed Jobe is on it.
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: another club keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
Inhulets will keep picking him until June and will get nothing for him after it. Danylo Tuzenko has pre-agreed a move to Chornomorets, and the only people who lose in that arrangement are the ones who let the contract run down.
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.
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.
6 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 manager has re-ordered his thinking and Muhammed Jobe has come out of it lower. He will be told it is temporary, and the players who have heard that before will avoid his eye.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Oleh Pushkariov trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
In brief
BoardroomA $323.4K-a-year partner for Chornomorets
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Chornomorets they have already started talking about him 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 Chornomorets can pretend not to have heard.
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.
Squad28 May 2029
Lee O'Connor 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.
Arsentiy Doroshenko 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.
Every club 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 it has been tried.
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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Chornomorets can pretend not to have heard.
Artur Riabov 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 May 2029
Lee O'Connor 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.
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.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Chornomorets, and both men came out saying it was fine.
He asked about his future and was given an answer with minutes in it. The manager has now made a promise in a building where promises are remembered, and the clock on it has started.
Numbers do not stay secret in a dressing room and never have. He is not asking for more than he is worth; he is asking why somebody beside him is worth more, and at Chornomorets that is a harder question to answer.
The language has come, the shrug has gone, and he argues in training like a man who expects to be here next year. None of it shows up on a fee and all of it shows up on the pitch.
Artur Riabov 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.
“Some mornings you wake up and you are still a long way from everything you know.” It is not the football and it never was; Chornomorets are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Jason Meerstadt was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Nobody at Chornomorets 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.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Chornomorets know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
48 points from position 5. The title is somebody else’s business and the drop is somebody else’s problem; what is left is the argument about passports.
Dmytro Forsiuk 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 version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Mukhammad Dzhurabaiev is living that version at Chornomorets, and it tends to show in the first month.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Lee O'Connor was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The demotion a club never announces and a dressing room always notices. Maksym Andrushchenko is further from the side than he was, and the reason will not be given until he asks.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Chornomorets, and both men came out saying it was fine.
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 Vladyslav Kravets is on 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 Dmytro Kliots has written the date down.
Artur Riabov and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad30 Apr 2029
Words at Chornomorets training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Lee O'Connor 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.
Squad30 Apr 2029
8 new faces, and Chornomorets are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
Boardroom30 Apr 2029
91% of the income goes out in wages at Chornomorets
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.
Wages have outrun income and the accountants have started attending meetings they used to send apologies to. Ambition comes second in a season like this.
Nobody at Chornomorets 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.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Chornomorets have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Artur Riabov 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Jason Meerstadt was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
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 Anel Ryce is on it.
Artur Riabov 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.
Squad16 Apr 2029
Words at Chornomorets training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Lee O'Connor 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 Chornomorets 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.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Chornomorets know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Chornomorets, and both men came out saying it was fine.
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 Dmytro Kliots has written the date down.
48 points from position 5. The title is somebody else’s business and the drop is somebody else’s problem; what is left is the argument about passports.
A new face in his position, and Dmytro Kliots suddenly has to win back what he thought he owned. Chornomorets have promised nothing — clubs rarely do at this stage.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Chornomorets can pretend not to have heard.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Chornomorets this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and Chornomorets know it.
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 manager has re-ordered his thinking and Amando Lapage has come out of it lower. He will be told it is temporary, and the players who have heard that before will avoid his eye.
7 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.
There is a figure at which a wage bill stops being ambitious and becomes the reason nothing else is possible, and this club has reached it. Nothing is left over for a transfer, a stand or a rainy afternoon.
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.
Artur Riabov 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.
Some transfers need a press campaign. This one needed a shirt with the old number on it. Illia Ukhan is a Chornomorets player again, and the town has its story of the summer.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Illia Ukhan is living that version at Chornomorets, and it tends to show in the first month.
Squad26 Mar 2029
Lee O'Connor 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.
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 Anel Ryce is on it.
Dmytro Forsiuk and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad19 Mar 2029
Lee O'Connor 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.
“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.
Squad19 Mar 2029
A Chornomorets teenager takes the young player award
Nazar Semenenko is 20, and for one weekend he was the best of everybody his age in the division. Nobody should build a career on it and everybody quietly does.
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 Muhammed Jobe is on it.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Yevhenii Profatylo trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Chornomorets know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Position 5 on 48 points, and the places that carry a European ticket are close enough to count. Seasons like this are decided by two results in April, and the club knows which two.
48 points, and the season has a number on it. Whatever it felt like from the inside, this is what it will look like in a book.
Player ratings12 Mar 2029
Nazar Semenenko, 20, plays like he has been here for years — 7.73
A mark of 7.73 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Chornomorets this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Chornomorets can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
Artur Riabov and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad5 Mar 2029
Lee O'Connor 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 approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.
Match3 Mar 2029
Another one collected away from home
3 on the bounce on the road for Chornomorets. The coaches leave early, arrive at unlovely grounds in the dark, and keep coming home with three points.
Squad5 Mar 2029
Dmytro Forsiuk is the division's best young player this month
At 20 he has spent a month being better than everybody his age in the league, which is a different and harder thing than one good afternoon. Chornomorets will try very hard not to make too much 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 Chornomorets, 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.
Two goals and a mark of 8.23 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
The fee was agreed and the flight was looked at — and then the phone stopped ringing. Dynamo Kyiv moved on, Gabi Caschili reports back to Chornomorets, and everybody pretends Monday is just Monday.
The hardest thing about being 20 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Dmytro Forsiuk did not need any: 8.61, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
The bid was some way short and Chornomorets did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Boardroom26 Feb 2029
Deadline passes with 5 signed and 1 gone
That is the business done at Chornomorets until the window opens again. Whether it was enough will be answered on Saturdays rather than in a column, and the first Saturday is close.
3 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Chornomorets can pretend not to have heard.
The name of Arsentiy Doroshenko has come up in conversations Chornomorets were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Every footballer has an answer to the question about his boyhood club, and most of them never get to act on it. Myroslav Serdiuk has, at Chornomorets, and the first month will show what that does to a man.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Artur Riabov was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Podillia will want this one forgotten quickly: 4‑1, every duel lost, and a long ride home. Chornomorets were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.
Two goals and a mark of 9.07 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Two goals and a mark of 9.01 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
“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 Chornomorets, and it is not being withdrawn.
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: Shakhtar keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Chornomorets this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad12 Feb 2029
Lee O'Connor 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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Metalist have kept their man, and Chornomorets go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
The hardest thing about being 20 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Dmytro Forsiuk did not need any: 7.63, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Chornomorets 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: Shakhtar keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
Chornomorets asked and Vorskla 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 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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 18 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Chornomorets have done the hard part with Polissia, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Chornomorets this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad29 Jan 2029
Words at Chornomorets training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Artur Riabov 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. Kolos have kept their man, and Chornomorets go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Three points for Chornomorets, 1‑0 the final word against Obolon in a contest settled by the finer margins.
Player ratings29 Jan 2029
Artur Avahimian was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.11. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 26 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
The run now stands at 5, and the questions being asked around Chornomorets are no longer polite ones.
Squad22 Jan 2029
Artur Riabov 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Chornomorets this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
100 games in the shirt. Nobody sets out to build a record like that; it happens to a certain kind of player at a certain kind of club, and this town knows what it has.
The dugout22 Jan 2029
The manager’s verdict
“I am frustrated, honestly. We did enough to win and we did not win.” Mykola Shevchuk was not hiding it after 0‑0, and nobody in the Chornomorets dressing room was either.
Looking ahead22 Jan 2029
Chornomorets take on the side everybody is chasing
Obolon arrive as leaders. A side at the top is beaten roughly once a month, and the club that does it gets a week it remembers for a year.
Successful dribbles: 13. 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.
In brief
The dugoutThe plan did not have a place for Dmytro Kliots
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Chornomorets will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about 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 Chornomorets this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The paperwork is done long before the player is. Anton Harabazhii has agreed terms to come here when his current deal runs out, which means Chornomorets have spent a summer's transfer budget on a phone call.
The manager kept them in and said what needed saying. A response is expected on Saturday, and if it does not come the questions move upstairs.
The dugout15 Jan 2029
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 1‑2 Mykola Shevchuk left the room before anybody could ask which.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Chornomorets will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Chornomorets they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
The offer from Kapaz for Illia Popovych 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.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Artur Avahimian and Chornomorets agree another 3 years.
Squad8 Jan 2029
Artur Riabov 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.
Nothing happens for months and then he simply arrives, at no cost, having signed a pre-contract while still turning out for somebody else. It is the least dramatic way to sign a footballer and frequently the shrewdest.
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and Chornomorets know it.
“It is not the end of the world and it is not good enough. Both of those are true.” The manager, after a 0‑0 draw, said the honest thing and then went to say it again inside.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Chornomorets will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Artur Riabov 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.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Mykola Shevchuk after 0‑2, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Chornomorets told Gabi Caschili something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Oleksandr Kamenskyi was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Artur Riabov 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.
Boardroom25 Dec 2028
110% of the income goes out in wages at Chornomorets
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.
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.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Dmytro Kliots trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
“A point is a point and I will take it, but we should have had all three.” Mykola Shevchuk after the 1‑1 draw, and the sentence every manager in the country said at some stage this weekend.
At 2 goals adrift this was a formality, and the formality lasted right up until it did not. Chornomorets found something the first half had given no notice of, and Livyi Bereh could not hold what they had.
Dmytro Forsiuk 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.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Dmytro Forsiuk. 3‑2 against Livyi Bereh, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Artur Riabov 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 21-year-old it feels ownership of. Oleksandr Kamenskyi 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.
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.
Marked 8.14 — 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.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Chornomorets they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Dmytro Forsiuk 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.
13 combined actions and 6.51. 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.
Squad11 Dec 2028
Artur Riabov 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 paperwork is done long before the player is. Yuriy Romaniuk has agreed terms to come here when his current deal runs out, which means Chornomorets have spent a summer's transfer budget on a phone call.
7.79, 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.
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.
Nobody will confirm this and nothing else explains the last month of selections. A costly error buys a player a period of being second choice that is always longer than the error was.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Artur Riabov was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Lee O'Connor, and the manager let it.
Boardroom27 Nov 2028
118% of the income goes out in wages at Chornomorets
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.
Half the programme played, position 6, 21 on the board. Doubling it is the sum every supporter has done and the only one nobody at the club will do out loud.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Mykola Shevchuk after 1‑2, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
Squad27 Nov 2028
5 new faces, and Chornomorets are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
Every touch is being weighed now, in print and everywhere else. Some players grow into that and some are quietly ruined by it, and nobody knows which in advance.
In brief
The dugoutThe plan did not have a place for Dmytro Kliots
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Chornomorets this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad20 Nov 2028
Words at Chornomorets training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Oleksandr Kamenskyi 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.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Adrien’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Chornomorets needing him to play as if none of it matters.
He asked about his future and was given an answer with minutes in it. The manager has now made a promise in a building where promises are remembered, and the clock on it has started.
The shrug has gone, the language is coming, and he now argues in training like somebody who expects to be here next year. Half a signing's value is this and none of it appears on a fee.
BoardroomThe Chornomorets production line keeps running
120Edition
The Chornomorets Post
13 Nov 2028
From our football correspondentUpbeat
Player ratings13 Nov 2028
Dmytro Forsiuk, 20, plays like he has been here for years — 7.66
A mark of 7.66 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.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Chornomorets is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and Chornomorets know it.
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Arsentiy Doroshenko has his answer from Chornomorets; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Maksym Havura, and the manager let it.
Squad13 Nov 2028
Words at Chornomorets training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Oleksandr Kamenskyi 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.
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 7.98 for the rest of 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 Chornomorets this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Artur Riabov was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
2 goals before the ground had finished arriving. Prykarpattia spent the rest of the afternoon playing a match that had already been decided, and everybody in the stadium knew it.
A goalkeeper's career is counted in the games nobody scored in, and Maksym Koval now has 25 of them across 387 appearances. Nothing about that number was luck.
In brief
BoardroomNobody left the Chornomorets dressing room in a hurry
1 for Amando Lapage, marked 7.77, and a centre-half's name in the part of the report he normally only reaches by mistake. He will not be allowed to forget it in the dressing room for a month.
Artur Riabov 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.
“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.
Player ratings30 Oct 2028
Artur Avahimian was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.24. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
Boardroom30 Oct 2028
121% of the income goes out in wages at Chornomorets
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.
The board was up, the win was priced in, and then Probiy scored. There is no worse minute to concede in and the ground emptied in the silence that follows one.
8 new signings in one window. Every one may be an upgrade and the side can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild the verdicts never mention.
Squad30 Oct 2028
Words at Chornomorets training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Oleksandr Kamenskyi 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.
Dmytro Forsiuk 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.
He is 21 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.
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.03, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
Squad23 Oct 2028
Words at Chornomorets training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Oleksandr Kamenskyi 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 dugout23 Oct 2028
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.” Mykola Shevchuk, on a 4‑1 win that he was already picking apart on the walk to the press room.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Chornomorets they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad16 Oct 2028
Artur Riabov 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.
Arsentiy Doroshenko 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.
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Chornomorets has been clear about where Wiktor Biedrzycki stands, which is more than many ever get.
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 Oleksandr Kamenskyi is on it.
Podillia next, and one man in the Chornomorets dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought of him.
Numbers do not stay secret in a dressing room and never have. He is not asking for more than he is worth; he is asking why somebody beside him is worth more, and at Chornomorets that is a harder question to answer.
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 Arsentiy Doroshenko has written the date down.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Chornomorets this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Artur Riabov was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 3 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
“I watch every Chornomorets game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Oleksandriya runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
“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.
Artur Riabov 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.
“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.
Boardroom2 Oct 2028
108% of the income goes out in wages at Chornomorets
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.
11 new signings in one window. Every one may be an upgrade and the side can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild the verdicts never mention.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Mykola Shevchuk after 0‑3, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
In brief
SquadWords at Chornomorets training over how hard people work
The terracesThe spotlight tightens on Maksym Koval
Dmytro Forsiuk 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 midfielder is measured on whether the team functions when he is on the pitch, which is nearly impossible to see and completely obvious in retrospect. 10 actions, 6.64, and a manager who will not be substituting him again in a hurry.
Squad25 Sep 2028
Artur Riabov 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.
“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 dugout25 Sep 2028
The manager’s verdict
“I am frustrated, honestly. We did enough to win and we did not win.” Mykola Shevchuk was not hiding it after 0‑0, and nobody in the Chornomorets dressing room was either.
Victoriia Sumy will want this one forgotten quickly: 4‑0, every duel lost, and a long ride home. Chornomorets were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Chornomorets is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
3 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
The rules permit it and it stings anyway. Vladyslav Sydorenko has agreed terms with Kudrivka for the summer, and until then he pulls on this shirt as a player who has already chosen his next one.
Dmytro Forsiuk 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 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.
He arrived for a fee and leaves for a fraction of it. $151.6K of what Chornomorets paid for Simon Haloian is money the club will not see again, and the boardroom will be asked about it for two seasons.
The deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 27 arrived, 23 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed one.
Chornomorets had done everything except persuade the man himself. He stays at Shakhtar, and the manager goes back to the drawing board with the money still in the bank.
Chornomorets asked and Polissia 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 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 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.
There is no crueller way to lose a football match. Chornomorets scored in the 112th minute, the restart barely happened, and the away end was still standing when the whistle went.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Chornomorets they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
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 7.89 for the rest of it.
Everything agreed with another club, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
Yehor Popravka 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: Dmytro Kliots. 3‑1 against Ahrobiznes, 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.
“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 Chornomorets, and it is not being withdrawn.
The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.
Squad28 Aug 2028
Words at Chornomorets training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Oleksandr Kapliienko 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 have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and Chornomorets know it.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Artem Serdiuk has just signed for Chornomorets, and for once the answer mattered.
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.
Chornomorets asked and Zorya 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 phone has started ringing about Roman Mysak again, and this time the name on the line is Rukh. Chornomorets are listening politely and promising nothing.
The dugout21 Aug 2028
The view from the dugout
“We will look at it, we will learn from it, and we go again.” The three sentences every manager keeps for a 0‑2 defeat, delivered by Mykola Shevchuk to a room that had heard them before.
Chornomorets have made the call to Shakhtar. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: Shakhtar keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
Yehor Popravka 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.
Every footballer has an answer to the question about his boyhood club, and most of them never get to act on it. Davyd Blahodarnyi has, at Chornomorets, and the first month will show what that does to a man.
Karpaty paid $210.0K and Chornomorets took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
Squad14 Aug 2028
Words at Chornomorets training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Oleksandr Kapliienko 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. Kolos have kept their man, and Chornomorets go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Chornomorets have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Chornomorets they have already started talking about him 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 Chornomorets can pretend not to have heard.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Chornomorets have done the hard part with Shakhtar, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
Yehor Popravka 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.
Kryvbas paid $560.0K and Chornomorets took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Oleksandr Kapliienko was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Chornomorets can pretend not to have heard.
A new deal for the man in the dugout, and the clearest thing a board can say without calling a press conference about it. Stability is cheap to promise and expensive to deliver.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Chornomorets this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Boardroom31 Jul 2028
5 academy players handed senior numbers at Chornomorets
The morning the pathway stops being a brochure and becomes a team sheet. Most of them will not be here in three years; all of them have already done the hard part, which was getting to today.
Squad31 Jul 2028
Words at Chornomorets training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Oleksandr Kapliienko 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.
Chornomorets asked and Shakhtar said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
“I know what people will say. I know what I want, and it is here.” Oleksandriya had the fee agreed and the shirt ready; they did not have the player, and now they will not.
Add another name to the list: Zorya have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Mykola Kohut. The answer from Chornomorets has not changed — yet.
The chase for Nazar Baida ended with $390.0K changing hands and Kryvbas out of reasons to say no. The supporters will judge the fee the only way that matters: on Saturdays.
Chornomorets asked and Dynamo Kyiv said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Oleksandr Kapliienko 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 Chornomorets, and it is not being withdrawn.
The clubs have shaken hands with Obolon; the player has not yet. Personal terms are next, and personal terms are where more deals die than anybody prints.
Everything agreed with Livyi Bereh, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
Chornomorets have gone to Dynamo Kyiv 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.
Yehor Popravka 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Oleksandr Kapliienko was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Chornomorets asked and Karpaty said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
“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 Chornomorets, and it is not being withdrawn.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Chornomorets is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Giorgi Robakidze and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad10 Jul 2028
Words at Chornomorets training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Oleksandr Kapliienko 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.
Chornomorets asked and Zorya said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Every shape has positions in it and this one does not have his. Chornomorets will either change the shape, change his job, or change his club, and he is waiting to hear which.
Victoriia Sumy have been asked whether they would lend him. Loans are agreed quickly or not at all, and this one will be one or the other by the weekend.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Zorya waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Chornomorets is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
“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 Chornomorets, and it is not being withdrawn.
Every footballer has an answer to the question about his boyhood club, and most of them never get to act on it. Maksym Havura has, at Chornomorets, and the first month will show what that does to a man.
LNZ paid $140.0K and Chornomorets took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
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. Bukovyna have kept their man, and Chornomorets go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
7 new signings in one window. Every one may be an upgrade and the side can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild the verdicts never mention.
In brief
Transfer targetsA loan move for Oleksandr Kemkin is in the works
Position 3, 55 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.
“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 Chornomorets, and it is not being withdrawn.
The offer from Bukovyna for Vladyslav Kravets 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.
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.
Chornomorets asked and Oleksandriya 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 phone has started ringing about Roman Mysak again, and this time the name on the line is Rukh. Chornomorets are listening politely and promising nothing.
Chornomorets have made the call to Shakhtar. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
The offer from Kolos for Giorgi Robakidze 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.
Yehor Popravka 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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Dynamo Kyiv have kept their man, and Chornomorets go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Chornomorets have made the call to Kryvbas. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
Chornomorets have made the call to Livyi Bereh. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
15 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Chornomorets lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Ruslan Buriak will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Chornomorets the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Yehor Popravka 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 Oleksandr Kapliienko was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
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 Muhammed Jobe is on it.
The words a physio says slowly. 22 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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Chornomorets can pretend not to have heard.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Chornomorets this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Oleksandr Kapliienko was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
9 new signings in one window. Every one may be an upgrade and the side can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild the verdicts never mention.
In brief
The dugoutMaksym Luniov knocks on the manager's door
29 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Chornomorets lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
Oleksandr Kapliienko 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 Jason Meerstadt was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
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 Maksym Luniov is on it.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Maksym Luniov trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
36 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Chornomorets lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Chornomorets will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Diego Arroyo 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.
“I watch every Chornomorets game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Rukh 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 Oleksandr Pshenychniuk is on it.
He asked about his future and was given an answer with minutes in it. The manager has now made a promise in a building where promises are remembered, and the clock on it has started.
In brief
BoardroomThe Chornomorets production line keeps running
The words a physio says slowly. 45 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.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Chornomorets will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Chornomorets they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Diego Arroyo 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.
Squad15 May 2028
Words at Chornomorets training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Yevhen Pavliuk 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 Vladyslav Sydorenko is on it.
5 goals in 21 games at Inhulets — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Chornomorets updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
54 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Chornomorets lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Chornomorets will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Chornomorets can pretend not to have heard.
61 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Chornomorets lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Chornomorets 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.
“I watch every Chornomorets game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Kryvbas runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
“I did not come here to warm up in front of people.” He is out of contract eventually, he is old enough to count the weeks, and Chornomorets will have to give him a reason to stay or an exit.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Amando Lapage trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
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 Vladyslav Kravets is on it.
68 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Chornomorets lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
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.
9 new signings in one window. Every one may be an upgrade and the side can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild the verdicts never mention.
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.
76 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Chornomorets lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Ruslan Buriak will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Chornomorets the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Diego Arroyo 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Yevhen Pavliuk was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Nobody makes a documentary about a hamstring and everybody in the game fears one. Chornomorets will be careful with the return date, because the second one is always worse than the first.
Nobody at Chornomorets 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.
In brief
Loan watchThe goals keep arriving from Maksym Luniov’s exile
83 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Chornomorets lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Chornomorets have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Diego Arroyo and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad10 Apr 2028
Words at Chornomorets training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Yevhen Pavliuk 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.
90 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Chornomorets lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
“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 Chornomorets, and it is not being withdrawn.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Chornomorets 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.
Something was said to Ruslan Buriak and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
Nobody at Chornomorets 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.
The words a physio says slowly. 97 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.
Diego Arroyo 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 Yevhen Pavliuk was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Nobody at Chornomorets 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.
There is a level at which a footballer stops being tested and starts being contained, and he reached it some time ago. Chornomorets know it, and so does everybody who watches him.
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 Yevhenii Riazantsev has written the date down.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Chornomorets they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
The rules permit it and it stings anyway. Ruslan Buriak has agreed terms with Karpaty for the summer, and until then he pulls on this shirt as a player who has already chosen his next one.
Diego Arroyo 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.
Squad20 Mar 2028
Words at Chornomorets training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Yevhen Pavliuk 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.
8 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.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Amando Lapage and Chornomorets agree another 4 years.
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 Vladyslav Sydorenko is on it.
The last league game has been played and the table has stopped moving: 55 points. The summer begins on Monday, and so does the argument about what it all meant.
A mark of 8.10 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.
Diego Arroyo and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad13 Mar 2028
Words at Chornomorets training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Yevhen Pavliuk 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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 21-year-old it feels ownership of. Oleksandr Pshenychniuk 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.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Jason Meerstadt and Chornomorets agree another 4 years.
“I did not come here to warm up in front of people.” He is out of contract eventually, he is old enough to count the weeks, and Chornomorets will have to give him a reason to stay or an exit.
Position 3, 52 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.
At 22 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Chornomorets this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Chornomorets asked and Metalist said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
He is doing things every Saturday that nobody around him can answer. It is flattering for a season and a problem after that, and Chornomorets know which stage they are at.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Chornomorets, and 0 appearances in 5 say he has earned the hearing.
The dugout6 Mar 2028
The view from the dugout
“We will look at it, we will learn from it, and we go again.” The three sentences every manager keeps for a 0‑1 defeat, delivered by Mykola Shevchuk to a room that had heard them before.
A brace, and Dmytro Kliots takes the afternoon — 8.36
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Dmytro Kliots provided it, and the 8.36 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Chornomorets may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.
Boardroom28 Feb 2028
Deadline passes with 4 signed and 5 gone
That is the business done at Chornomorets until the window opens again. Whether it was enough will be answered on Saturdays rather than in a column, and the first Saturday is close.
Diego Arroyo 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 Yevhen Pavliuk was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The fixture the rest of the division is looking forward to more than either of the sides in it. Both know a win changes the season and a defeat does not end it, which is what makes it hard to play.
Probiy will want this one forgotten quickly: 3‑0, every duel lost, and a long ride home. Chornomorets were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.
Player ratings21 Feb 2028
A brace, and Elmedin Rama takes the afternoon — 8.79
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Elmedin Rama provided it, and the 8.79 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
“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 Chornomorets, and it is not being withdrawn.
14 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere else.
1 for Dmytro Kliots, marked 7.88, and a centre-half's name in the part of the report he normally only reaches by mistake. He will not be allowed to forget it in the dressing room for a month.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Chornomorets have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Chornomorets had done everything except persuade the man himself. He stays at Dynamo Kyiv, and the manager goes back to the drawing board with the money still in the bank.
Diego Arroyo 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Yevhen Pavliuk was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Chornomorets can pretend not to have heard.
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at Dynamo Kyiv is saying, and nobody at Chornomorets is enjoying the guessing.
Chornomorets asked and UCSA said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Player ratings14 Feb 2028
Artur Avahimian was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.09. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
In brief
The dugoutThe manager makes an example of Gabi Caschili
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Chornomorets people have started saying his name in the past tense.
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.
Position 3, 45 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.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Chornomorets have done the hard part with LNZ, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Chornomorets this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Yevhen Pavliuk was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Elmedin Rama 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.
Squad31 Jan 2028
Words at Chornomorets training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Yevhen Pavliuk 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 manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Giorgi Robakidze has his answer from Chornomorets; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
The dugout31 Jan 2028
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 Mykola Shevchuk left the room before anybody could ask which.
12 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere else.
Successful dribbles: 24. 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.
Diego Arroyo 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.
Squad24 Jan 2028
Words at Chornomorets training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Oleksandr Kapliienko 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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 22-year-old it feels ownership of. Elmedin Rama 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.
Two sides from the top of the table, one afternoon, and a month of talk decided in ninety minutes. Chornomorets will not use the word title this week and will not stop thinking it.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Moses Jarju will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Chornomorets the goodbyes have quietly begun.
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 23 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.
Add another name to the list: Radnik Surdulica have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Vladyslav Kravets. The answer from Chornomorets has not changed — yet.
A 1‑0 win over Victoriia Sumy, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
11 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere else.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Chornomorets this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad10 Jan 2028
Words at Chornomorets training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Yevhen Pavliuk 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.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Artur Avahimian. 1‑0 against Ahrobiznes, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Chornomorets has been clear about where Ruslan Buriak stands, which is more than many ever get.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Chornomorets 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.
Four or five weekends of consistency, judged against everybody in the division doing his job. Oleh Pushkariov has come out of that comparison in the side, and Chornomorets have had the benefit of every one of those afternoons.
“It is not the end of the world and it is not good enough. Both of those are true.” The manager, after a 0‑0 draw, said the honest thing and then went to say it again inside.
1 for Oleh Pushkariov, marked 7.54, and a centre-half's name in the part of the report he normally only reaches by mistake. He will not be allowed to forget it in the dressing room for a month.
10 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
Elmedin Rama and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad27 Dec 2027
Words at Chornomorets training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Yevhen Pavliuk 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 board was up, the win was priced in, and then Metalurh Zaporizhzhia scored. There is no worse minute to concede in and the ground emptied in the silence that follows one.
It needed Oleh Pushkariov to find the net to bring anything home at all: 1‑1 against Metalurh Zaporizhzhia, and half the dressing room will call it a point won.
“A point is a point and I will take it, but we should have had all three.” Mykola Shevchuk after the 1‑1 draw, and the sentence every manager in the country said at some stage this weekend.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Chornomorets is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Diego Arroyo 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.
Successful dribbles: 17. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
The dugout20 Dec 2027
The view from the dugout
“We did not lose. Some weeks that is all you get, and I would rather have the point than not.” Mykola Shevchuk chose the glass-half-full version of 0‑0; the supporters left with the other one.
The crowd waited for a goal that never came. Livyi Bereh defended in numbers and left with what they came for, and the two sides could be playing still without troubling a scorer.
There were 89 minutes on the clock and UCSA had all but banked the point. Football rarely reads the room, and Chornomorets did not stop to explain themselves.
Position 3, 30 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.
Elmedin Rama 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.
9 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
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.
Three points for Chornomorets, 2‑1 the final word against UCSA in a contest settled by the finer margins.
Player ratings13 Dec 2027
Artur Avahimian was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.31. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
“The players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 2‑1, Mykola Shevchuk could afford to be generous.
In brief
The dugoutThe manager makes an example of Moses Jarju
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Chornomorets have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
1 for Oleh Pushkariov, marked 7.41, and a centre-half's name in the part of the report he normally only reaches by mistake. He will not be allowed to forget it in the dressing room for a 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 Chornomorets 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.
At 23 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.
50 for the club now, each one filed in somebody’s memory with a date and a scoreline. Numbers like this are what supporters argue about in twenty years.
2 in front and in complete control, and it finished with Bukovyna the happier side. There is no version of this afternoon that Chornomorets will enjoy reviewing.
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.
Match27 Nov 2027
After 6 games, Chornomorets finally taste it again
The first defeat in 6 matches. The manager will say it had to come; the dressing room will say it did not have to come against Bukovyna; the supporters will say both, in that order, all week.
8 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere else.
Half the programme played, position 7, 24 on the board. Doubling it is the sum every supporter has done and the only one nobody at the club will do out loud.
6 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.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Chornomorets is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Diego Arroyo 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.
He is 22 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.
Diego Arroyo 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 Yevhen Pavliuk was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
One weekend, judged against everybody else's. Giorgi Robakidze has come out on top of it, and for most footballers a weekly award is the only silverware a career ever produces.
Nobody at Chornomorets 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.
Oleksandriya next, and one man in the Chornomorets dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought of him.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Gabi Caschili trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
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 Oleh Pushkariov has written the date down.
5 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Chornomorets 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.
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.
A month is long enough that nobody gets in by accident. Artur Avahimian is in the division's best eleven for it, which is a quieter compliment than an award and a more reliable one.
Two goals and a mark of 8.35 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Chornomorets can pretend not to have heard.
4 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
Centre-halves are allowed forward twice a season and are judged on what they do when they get there. Oleh Pushkariov scored, was marked 7.82, and got back before anybody noticed he had gone.
Defending was optional and nobody took up the option. 6 goals between Chornomorets and Probiy, 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 Oleksandr Kapliienko was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
At 23 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 Maksym Koval
Player ratingsNinety minutes of Mykola Kohut at his very best
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Moses Jarju will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Chornomorets the goodbyes have quietly begun.
3 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
Elmedin Rama 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.
Squad25 Oct 2027
Words at Chornomorets training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Yevhen Pavliuk 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.
Marked 8.02 — 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.
6 new signings in one window. Every one may be an upgrade and the side can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild the verdicts never mention.
6.00, 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.
Diego Arroyo 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.
Squad18 Oct 2027
Words at Chornomorets training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Yevhen Pavliuk 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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Yehor Popravka 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.
The injury that keeps coming back, keeps being rushed back from, and quietly costs more careers than the dramatic ones. 15 days is the estimate; the honest figure depends on whether anybody is patient.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Chornomorets this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad11 Oct 2027
Words at Chornomorets training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Oleksandr Kapliienko 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 not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Chornomorets told Diego Arroyo something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
The dugout11 Oct 2027
Maksym Koval is still being punished for one mistake
Nobody will confirm it and the team sheets confirm it every week. One error has bought him a spell as second choice that is already longer than the error deserved.
He is doing things on a Saturday afternoon that nobody around him can answer, which is flattering for about one season and a problem after that. Chornomorets will not keep him by pretending otherwise.
Moses Jarju has done the arithmetic and does not like the answer. Nothing corrodes a squad faster, and no club has ever solved it by explaining the wage structure to a footballer.
10 without a win is the sort of run that changes how a town talks about its club, and Kudrivka were the afternoon it stopped. Nothing is fixed by one result and everything feels different by one.
7.88, 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.
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 22 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.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Chornomorets is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Diego Arroyo 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.
9 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 dugout27 Sep 2027
The manager’s verdict
“I am frustrated, honestly. We did enough to win and we did not win.” Mykola Shevchuk was not hiding it after 0‑0, and nobody in the Chornomorets dressing room was either.
In brief
Looking aheadA test against the best for Chornomorets
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Chornomorets this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad20 Sep 2027
Words at Chornomorets training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Oleksandr Kapliienko 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.
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.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Chornomorets have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Everything was agreed until it was not, and Maksym Luniov reports back to Chornomorets with a summer to forget. Neither club is saying who walked away from the table.
The deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 20 arrived, 8 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed one.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Chornomorets 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.
3 games without scoring. Strikers stop looking up, midfielders take the extra touch, and every shot that clears the bar is followed by a groan that has been building since the last goal.