From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Squad26 Oct 2026
A falling-out at Inhulets
José Bernal and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Match24 Oct 2026
It finished 2‑1, and it was Bohdan Mohylnyi’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Inhulets.
Player ratings26 Oct 2026
Successful dribbles: 19. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Player ratings26 Oct 2026
Marked 8.48 — 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.
Player ratings26 Oct 2026
Ninety minutes of Rostyslav Rusyn at his very best
Marked 8.06. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Inhulets.
Squad26 Oct 2026
57 days, the medical staff say, and medical staff are optimists by profession. The team sheet will look wrong without him.
The dugout26 Oct 2026
The manager’s verdict
“I am not going to get carried away and I will not let them either. It was a good day. There will be harder ones.” Taras Zinchenko kept it short after the 2‑1 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.
The dugout26 Oct 2026
Somebody else is better right now than Oleksandr Domoleha
The team sheet says it in public every week until it changes. The only version of being dropped a footballer cannot argue with, and the one he takes hardest.
The dugout26 Oct 2026
“I would rather say it to his face than read about it.” The meeting was requested by the player, which tells you most of what you need to know.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Steady
Player ratings19 Oct 2026
Successful dribbles: 25. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad19 Oct 2026
Words at Inhulets training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. José Bernal 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.
Match17 Oct 2026
Three points for Inhulets, 2‑1 the final word against Feniks in a contest settled by the finer margins.
Squad19 Oct 2026
A falling-out at Inhulets
Illia Hadzhuk and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Player ratings19 Oct 2026
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.74, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
The dugout19 Oct 2026
“We earned that. I asked them for a reaction and I got one, and now I want the same again on Saturday.” Taras Zinchenko on a 2‑1 afternoon that pleased him more than he was prepared to show.
The dugout19 Oct 2026
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Inhulets, and both men came out saying it was fine.
The dugout19 Oct 2026
A promise honoured at Inhulets
Something was said to Rostyslav Bahlai and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
The dugout19 Oct 2026
Somebody else is better right now than Stanislav Ursolov
The team sheet says it in public every week until it changes. The only version of being dropped a footballer cannot argue with, and the one he takes hardest.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad12 Oct 2026
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the whole of the defence. 9 saves, several of them the kind nobody expects to see made, and ten outfield players who owe him a drink.
Squad12 Oct 2026
Vitalii Dubilei 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.
Match10 Oct 2026
Bohdan Mohylnyi scored, and precious little else went right: 1‑3 to Bukovyna, and a quiet walk to the dressing room.
Squad12 Oct 2026
A row about effort at Inhulets
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and José Bernal was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Market12 Oct 2026
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Ivan Kryvtsov 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.
Market12 Oct 2026
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Viktor Nazarenko 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.
The dugout12 Oct 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Oleksandr Domoleha, and the manager let it.
Squad12 Oct 2026
13 new faces, and Inhulets 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.
The dugout12 Oct 2026
“I could talk about decisions and I could talk about luck. I will not. We lost.” The manager, 1‑3, and a press conference that lasted four minutes.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Player ratings5 Oct 2026
Successful dribbles: 33. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Words exchanged at Inhulets
José Bernal 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.
Boardroom5 Oct 2026
Wages swallow 184% of the Inhulets income
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.
Match3 Oct 2026
0‑1 to Prykarpattia, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
The dugout5 Oct 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Dmytro Bezkleinyi, and the manager let it.
The dugout5 Oct 2026
The manager’s verdict
“That is on me. I pick the team and I picked wrong.” Managers say that when they mean it and when they need to be seen to, and after 0‑1 Taras Zinchenko left the room before anybody could ask which.
Squad5 Oct 2026
“I have done everything asked of me in training and it has not changed a thing on a Saturday.” The most familiar complaint in football, and one Inhulets will have to answer with minutes or with a transfer.
Squad5 Oct 2026
A place in the month's best eleven for Illia Hadzhuk
Four or five weekends of consistency, judged against everybody in the division doing his job. Illia Hadzhuk has come out of that comparison in the side, and Inhulets have had the benefit of every one of those afternoons.
The dugout5 Oct 2026
Somebody else has been better, the manager has said so with a team sheet, and there is no argument to be had. He will get the shirt back the only way it can be got back.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Match26 Sep 2026
4‑0, and the margin flattered nobody — it could have carried another goal or two without complaint. Afternoons like this are why people keep coming.
Player ratings28 Sep 2026
A brace, and Bohdan Mohylnyi takes the afternoon — 9.38
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Bohdan Mohylnyi provided it, and the 9.38 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Player ratings28 Sep 2026
Illia Hadzhuk pops up at the right end — 7.91
7.91, 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.
Squad28 Sep 2026
A falling-out at Inhulets
Vitalii Dubilei and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad28 Sep 2026
José Bernal 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.
Player ratings28 Sep 2026
Ninety minutes of José Bernal at his very best
Marked 8.80. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Inhulets.
Match26 Sep 2026
2 goals inside twenty minutes with Bohdan Mohylnyi in the middle of it, and Podillia unable to get near the ball long enough to change anything. Some matches are won before the first drink.
The dugout28 Sep 2026
“We earned that. I asked them for a reaction and I got one, and now I want the same again on Saturday.” Taras Zinchenko on a 4‑0 afternoon that pleased him more than he was prepared to show.
The dugout28 Sep 2026
Somebody else is better right now than Oleksandr Domoleha
The team sheet says it in public every week until it changes. The only version of being dropped a footballer cannot argue with, and the one he takes hardest.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match19 Sep 2026
Chastening afternoon for Inhulets
A 0‑3 beating by Chornomorets was the sort of result that empties a stadium long before the final whistle.
Squad21 Sep 2026
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.
Squad21 Sep 2026
José Bernal 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 Inhulets this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Player ratings21 Sep 2026
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, 6.98, and a manager who will not be substituting him again in a hurry.
The dugout21 Sep 2026
“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.
Boardroom21 Sep 2026
Nobody left the Inhulets dressing room in a hurry
The door stayed shut a long time after the final whistle. What was said in there is between them; whether it worked is between them and Saturday.
Player ratings21 Sep 2026
Successful dribbles: 16. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
The dugout21 Sep 2026
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 0‑3 defeat, delivered by Taras Zinchenko to a room that had heard them before.
Squad21 Sep 2026
Nazar Prykhodko 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 ratings14 Sep 2026
Successful dribbles: 39. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
Market14 Sep 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.
Boardroom14 Sep 2026
Deadline passes with 22 signed and 0 gone
That is the business done at Inhulets 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.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Maksym Radchenko arrives at the club he grew up with
Every footballer has an answer to the question about his boyhood club, and most of them never get to act on it. Maksym Radchenko has, at Inhulets, and the first month will show what that does to a man.
Squad14 Sep 2026
José Bernal 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.
Transfer targets14 Sep 2026
Inhulets asked and Talleres said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Market14 Sep 2026
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Pavlo Shakhov is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
The dugout14 Sep 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.
Market14 Sep 2026
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Inhulets, another week without a signature from José Bernal.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Player ratings7 Sep 2026
Successful dribbles: 31. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad7 Sep 2026
José Bernal gets the move he always wanted
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. José Bernal has just signed for Inhulets, and for once the answer mattered.
Market7 Sep 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.
Squad7 Sep 2026
Words exchanged at Inhulets
Vitalii Dubilei 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.
Match5 Sep 2026
It had gone 6 games. The players did not celebrate like men who had won a match; they celebrated like men who had been let out of something.
Squad7 Sep 2026
José Bernal 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.
Transfer targets7 Sep 2026
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.
Player ratings7 Sep 2026
Ninety minutes of Bohdan Mohylnyi at his very best
Marked 8.05. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Inhulets.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Match26 Aug 2026
Inhulets bow out of the cup
Polissia go through and Inhulets go home, 0‑4 the scoreline that did it. The dressing room will call the league the priority now, because that is what dressing rooms say.
Squad31 Aug 2026
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.
The terraces31 Aug 2026
Inhulets are taken apart by Polissia — and the town wants answers
It finished 0-4. A cup exit is a disappointment; this was a public dismantling, and the difference between the two is the number of people who will still be talking about it in August.
Match29 Aug 2026
The wait goes on for Inhulets
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.
Player ratings31 Aug 2026
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 7.84 for the rest of it.
Market31 Aug 2026
Inhulets spend $270.0K to raise the standard
This is not cover and nobody is pretending it is. $270.0K has been paid because Rostyslav Rusyn is straightforwardly better than what was already here, and the club has decided to stop waiting.
Transfer targets31 Aug 2026
Nyva wanted more than $74.0K and the board would not go there. Walked away, for now, which in a transfer window means until somebody blinks.
Squad31 Aug 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 Inhulets this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The dugout31 Aug 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.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match22 Aug 2026
No end in sight to Inhulets's wait for a win
4 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Inhulets has to find a result from somewhere.
Transfer targets24 Aug 2026
$270.0K on the table at Feniks. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
Match22 Aug 2026
Inhulets cannot find the net
4 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.
Transfer targets24 Aug 2026
Inhulets have gone to Nyva 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.
Transfer targets24 Aug 2026
Inhulets offered $360.0K; Dynamo Kyiv said it was not close. The manager will be told the money is still there for the right player, which is what managers are told.
Squad24 Aug 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 Inhulets this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Match22 Aug 2026
Metalist left with the points after a 0‑1 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
Player ratings24 Aug 2026
Successful dribbles: 17. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
The dugout24 Aug 2026
The manager’s verdict
“That is on me. I pick the team and I picked wrong.” Managers say that when they mean it and when they need to be seen to, and after 0‑1 Taras Zinchenko left the room before anybody could ask which.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Player ratings17 Aug 2026
Successful dribbles: 28. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Transfer targets17 Aug 2026
Inhulets 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.
Squad17 Aug 2026
Vitalii Dubilei 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.
Match15 Aug 2026
Inhulets cannot find the net
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.
Transfer targets17 Aug 2026
Inhulets 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.
Match15 Aug 2026
Beaten 0‑1, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
The dugout17 Aug 2026
The manager’s verdict
“That is on me. I pick the team and I picked wrong.” Managers say that when they mean it and when they need to be seen to, and after 0‑1 Taras Zinchenko left the room before anybody could ask which.
Squad17 Aug 2026
No place for Yuriy Dudnyk in the new shape
He is not being dropped. There is simply nowhere in the formation Inhulets are playing to put a man who does what he does, which is a harder thing to be told than any team sheet.
Transfer targets17 Aug 2026
Inhulets 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.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Player ratings10 Aug 2026
Successful dribbles: 29. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Transfer targets10 Aug 2026
The deal with Dynamo Kyiv is done in every sense but the one that puts him on the pitch. Nothing goes wrong at this stage, except on the occasions when it does.
Transfer targets10 Aug 2026
No deal for Wesley Pomba at that price
Inhulets offered $420.0K; Veres said it was not close. The manager will be told the money is still there for the right player, which is what managers are told.
Squad10 Aug 2026
A falling-out at Inhulets
Vitalii Dubilei and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad10 Aug 2026
17 days, the medical staff say, and medical staff are optimists by profession. The team sheet will look wrong without him.
Transfer targets10 Aug 2026
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Slavia Sofia have kept their man, and Inhulets go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Market10 Aug 2026
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Kyrylo Vanat 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
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Andriy Haiduchok 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
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Nazariy Mykhailychenko is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Squad3 Aug 2026
“The easiest signature of my career.” Stanislav-Nuri Malysh and Inhulets agree another 3 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Words exchanged at Inhulets
Vitalii Dubilei 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.
Transfer targets3 Aug 2026
Inhulets asked and Livyi Bereh 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 ratings3 Aug 2026
Successful dribbles: 18. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Market3 Aug 2026
Still no offer on the table, and Vitalii Dubilei’s deal keeps shrinking. In boardroom language, silence this long stops being an oversight and starts being an answer.
Transfer targets3 Aug 2026
Inhulets 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.
Player ratings3 Aug 2026
Marked 7.36 on an afternoon he ran from the first whistle to the last. Whatever else went wrong, Inhulets had the best player on the pitch.
Squad3 Aug 2026
5 new faces, and Inhulets 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.
The dugout3 Aug 2026
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.” Taras Zinchenko chose the glass-half-full version of 0‑0; the supporters left with the other one.