From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad9 Nov 2026
A fracture rules Bekkhan Aliev out for 47 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Sevastopol will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Player ratings9 Nov 2026
Successful dribbles: 32. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Market9 Nov 2026
“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 The request is on a desk at Sevastopol, and it is not being withdrawn.
Match7 Nov 2026
4 matches without a win for Sevastopol
The run now stands at 4, and the questions being asked around Sevastopol are no longer polite ones.
Match7 Nov 2026
4 matches without a goal for Sevastopol
The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 4 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
Squad9 Nov 2026
Words at Sevastopol training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Artem Stepanovich 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.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad2 Nov 2026
A fracture rules Bekkhan Aliev out for 54 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Sevastopol will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Market2 Nov 2026
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
Match31 Oct 2026
The goals have deserted Sevastopol
3 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Sevastopol can tell you which week it ends in.
Squad2 Nov 2026
Boris Bely 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.
Match31 Oct 2026
Kuban Holding left with the points after a 0‑1 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Squad2 Nov 2026
“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.
Squad2 Nov 2026
Words at Sevastopol training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Amet Dugu 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.
Player ratings2 Nov 2026
Successful dribbles: 14. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Market2 Nov 2026
“There is a gap, and pretending there is not helps nobody.” Neither side has moved, and the calendar is working for exactly one of them.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad26 Oct 2026
A fracture rules Bekkhan Aliev out for 61 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Sevastopol will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Market26 Oct 2026
Boris Bely hands in a written request
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Sevastopol can pretend not to have heard.
Squad26 Oct 2026
Words at Sevastopol training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Artem Stepanovich is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad19 Oct 2026
A fracture rules Bekkhan Aliev out for 68 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Sevastopol will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Market19 Oct 2026
Amet Dugu puts it in writing
“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 Sevastopol, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad19 Oct 2026
54 days, the medical staff say, and medical staff are optimists by profession. The team sheet will look wrong without him.
Squad19 Oct 2026
Dmitry Starodub 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.
Player ratings19 Oct 2026
Successful dribbles: 21. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Match17 Oct 2026
0‑1 to Spartak Nalchik, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad12 Oct 2026
A fracture rules Bekkhan Aliev out for 75 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Sevastopol will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Squad12 Oct 2026
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sevastopol this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Player ratings12 Oct 2026
Successful dribbles: 21. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Match10 Oct 2026
It finished 1‑0, and it was Yury Maximov’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Sevastopol.
Player ratings12 Oct 2026
A mark of 7.84, and nobody in the ground would argue with it. He was involved in everything that mattered and most of what did not.
Squad12 Oct 2026
Too much change too quickly at Sevastopol
12 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.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad5 Oct 2026
A fracture rules Bekkhan Aliev out for 82 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Sevastopol will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Match3 Oct 2026
9 matches without a win for Sevastopol
The run now stands at 9, and the questions being asked around Sevastopol are no longer polite ones.
Squad5 Oct 2026
“I was told what my role would be, and I signed on that basis. It has not happened.” A grievance with a date attached is the hardest kind to settle.
Player ratings5 Oct 2026
Successful dribbles: 23. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad5 Oct 2026
“The easiest signature of my career.” Lev Potapov and Sevastopol agree another 1 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Artem Stepanovich 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.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad28 Sep 2026
A fracture rules Bekkhan Aliev out for 89 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Sevastopol will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Player ratings28 Sep 2026
Successful dribbles: 36. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Match26 Sep 2026
8 matches without a win for Sevastopol
The run now stands at 8, and the questions being asked around Sevastopol are no longer polite ones.
Market28 Sep 2026
Ruslan Bagaev hands in a written request
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Sevastopol can pretend not to have heard.
Squad28 Sep 2026
Artem Stepanovich 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.
Squad28 Sep 2026
Amet Dugu 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.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Player ratings21 Sep 2026
Successful dribbles: 46. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad21 Sep 2026
A fracture rules Bekkhan Aliev out for 96 days
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Sevastopol will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Market21 Sep 2026
Amet Dugu puts it in writing
“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 Sevastopol, and it is not being withdrawn.
Match19 Sep 2026
The wait goes on for Sevastopol
7 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
Squad21 Sep 2026
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Pavel Klinov commits to Sevastopol for another 3 years.
Squad21 Sep 2026
Amet Dugu 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.
Squad21 Sep 2026
Words at Sevastopol training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Aleksey Sysoev 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.
Match19 Sep 2026
It finished 1‑1, and it somehow always looked like it would. One of those afternoons where the table moves less than the tempers.
Player ratings21 Sep 2026
Yury Yakunin changes it off the bench
He was not in the side at half past three and he had settled it before five. Half an hour, and Sevastopol had a different afternoon.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad14 Sep 2026
Bekkhan Aliev breaks a bone — 104 days out
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 104 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Market14 Sep 2026
“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 Sevastopol, and it is not being withdrawn.
Player ratings14 Sep 2026
Successful dribbles: 28. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Match12 Sep 2026
The wait goes on for Sevastopol
6 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.
Match12 Sep 2026
4 matches without a goal for Sevastopol
The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 4 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Words at Sevastopol training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Artem Stepanovich is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Market7 Sep 2026
“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 Sevastopol, and it is not being withdrawn.
Match5 Sep 2026
5 matches without a win for Sevastopol
The run now stands at 5, and the questions being asked around Sevastopol are no longer polite ones.
Match5 Sep 2026
3 matches without a goal for Sevastopol
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.
Squad7 Sep 2026
Artem Stepanovich 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.
Squad7 Sep 2026
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sevastopol this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Match5 Sep 2026
Pobeda left with the points after a 0‑1 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Player ratings31 Aug 2026
Successful dribbles: 37. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Market31 Aug 2026
Ruslan Bagaev hands in a written request
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Sevastopol can pretend not to have heard.
Match29 Aug 2026
4 matches without a win for Sevastopol
The run now stands at 4, and the questions being asked around Sevastopol are no longer polite ones.
Squad31 Aug 2026
Artem Stepanovich 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 Aug 2026
A move Makoto Kikushima would have made for nothing
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Makoto Kikushima is living that version at Sevastopol, and it tends to show in the first month.
Match29 Aug 2026
Beaten 0‑1, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Squad31 Aug 2026
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Ruslan Bagaev and Sevastopol agree another 3 years.
Squad31 Aug 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Serafim Chekhlov, and the manager let it.
Market31 Aug 2026
He is 20, and nobody at Sevastopol signed him for this season. Deals like this are judged in four years, by people who may not still be in the building.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match19 Aug 2026
Spartak Nalchik ended it 1‑2. The season narrows to the league now, and everyone in the ground knew it before the final whistle.
Squad24 Aug 2026
Ardijan Chilafi gets the move he always wanted
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Ardijan Chilafi has just signed for Sevastopol, and for once the answer mattered.
Market24 Aug 2026
KDV Tomsk did not want to sell and the number is why they did. $44.0K for Dmitry Starodub, and the expectation that arrives with him is the kind no amount of settling-in period softens.
Squad24 Aug 2026
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Ardijan Chilafi commits to Sevastopol for another 3 years.
Squad24 Aug 2026
Artem Stepanovich 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.
Squad24 Aug 2026
Dmitry Starodub 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.
Player ratings24 Aug 2026
Successful dribbles: 17. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Player ratings24 Aug 2026
Marked 7.99 on an afternoon he ran from the first whistle to the last. Whatever else went wrong, Sevastopol had the best player on the pitch.
Match22 Aug 2026
Ninety minutes, two goalkeepers with clean gloves, and not one finish worth keeping. Nart will be the happier side with the point.
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad17 Aug 2026
Aleksey Sysoev gets the move he always wanted
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Aleksey Sysoev has just signed for Sevastopol, and for once the answer mattered.
Squad17 Aug 2026
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Aleksey Sysoev and Sevastopol agree another 3 years.
Squad17 Aug 2026
Words at Sevastopol training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Artem Stepanovich 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.
Squad17 Aug 2026
Boris Bely in a row with a teammate
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Sevastopol this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Player ratings17 Aug 2026
Successful dribbles: 15. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Market17 Aug 2026
He is 20, and the scouting reports agree on the only line that matters: the ceiling. Signings like this are lottery tickets written by professionals.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Player ratings10 Aug 2026
Two goals and a mark of 8.27 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Squad10 Aug 2026
Artem Stepanovich 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.
Match8 Aug 2026
Three points for Sevastopol, 2‑0 the final word against Legion in a contest settled by the finer margins.
Market10 Aug 2026
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Dmitri Yermakov is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Market10 Aug 2026
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Grigory Shevchenko has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
Market10 Aug 2026
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Alexei Zaitsev has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
Market10 Aug 2026
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Pavel Dudko has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
Squad10 Aug 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Artem Stepanovich, and the manager let it.
Squad10 Aug 2026
5 new faces, and Sevastopol 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.
From our football correspondent
Triumph
Match1 Aug 2026
Kuban Holding will want this one forgotten quickly: 5‑0, every duel lost, and a long ride home. Sevastopol were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.
Squad3 Aug 2026
3 goals in one afternoon from one man. The other players were also present, a witness confirmed.
Player ratings3 Aug 2026
Age has not caught Redvan Osmanov yet — 9.86
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 9.86 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Market3 Aug 2026
Boris Bely hands in a written request
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Sevastopol can pretend not to have heard.
Squad3 Aug 2026
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Redvan Osmanov commits to Sevastopol for another 2 years.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Vladislav Kucheiko 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.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Artem Stepanovich 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.
Match1 Aug 2026
There is a particular helplessness in conceding 3 times before the twentieth minute. Kuban Holding tried to reorganise, Sevastopol did not allow it, and the result was written long before it was confirmed.
Player ratings3 Aug 2026
Ninety minutes of Artem Stepanovich at his very best
Marked 8.27. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Sevastopol.