“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Krylya Sovetov have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
3 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Krylya Sovetov can tell you which week it ends in.
8 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.
There is no complaint available here and everybody involved knows it, which does not make the walk to the bench any shorter. Form is the only currency in football that cannot be borrowed against.
The dugout26 Oct 2026
The manager’s verdict
“I am frustrated, honestly. We did enough to win and we did not win.” Artyom Zolotov was not hiding it after 0‑0, and nobody in the Krylya Sovetov dressing room was either.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Krylya Sovetov this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Krylya Sovetov told Martin Kramarič something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
“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.
There is no complaint available here and everybody involved knows it, which does not make the walk to the bench any shorter. Form is the only currency in football that cannot be borrowed against.
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.
Ninety minutes, no goals, and the argument started before the car park emptied: a point gained, or two thrown away against CSKA Moscow? Both sides of it will still be going on Thursday.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Facundo Melivilo trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
0‑4 to Spartak Moscow, and it was every bit as bad as the number suggests. There are defeats you argue about and defeats you apologise for; this was the second kind.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Vladimir Ignatenko and Krylya Sovetov agree another 5 years.
Fernando Costanza 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.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Maksim Popov is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
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.” Artyom Zolotov after 0‑4, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
Successful dribbles: 28. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
Player ratings5 Oct 2026
Artem Shumanskiy, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 8.15
A mark of 8.15 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.
Fernando Costanza 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: Denis Makarov. 2‑1 against Rostov, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
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.
200 games in this shirt, through managers and relegations and everything else. Service like it is disappearing from the game and the crowd knows what it is watching.
7 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.
A touch he did not want, a bounce he could not have read, and his name in the wrong column. There is no consoling a man after one of these, and Krylya Sovetov will not try tonight.
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.
Successful dribbles: 37. 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 chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 6 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Krylya Sovetov this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad21 Sep 2026
Words at Krylya Sovetov training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Mihajlo Banjac 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 makes a documentary about a hamstring and everybody in the game fears one. Krylya Sovetov will be careful with the return date, because the second one is always worse than the first.
Successful dribbles: 25. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Boardroom14 Sep 2026
Krylya Sovetov close the window on a squad of their own making
20 in and 10 out, and no more changes for months. The manager has what he has, the supporters have their opinion of it, and the table will have the last word.
5 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.
The name of Mihajlo Banjac has come up in conversations Krylya Sovetov were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Thomas Galdames 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.
Krylya Sovetov asked and Nizhniy Novgorod 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 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.
Thomas Galdames 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 month is long enough that nobody gets in by accident. Vadim Rakov is in the division's best eleven for it, which is a quieter compliment than an award and a more reliable one.
“A point is a point and I will take it, but we should have had all three.” Artyom Zolotov after the 0‑0 draw, and the sentence every manager in the country said at some stage this weekend.
In brief
The dugoutSomebody else is better right now than Facundo Melivilo
Krylya Sovetov asked and Ural 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 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.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 16 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
“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.
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.
The crowd waited for a goal that never came. Dinamo Moscow defended in numbers and left with what they came for, and the two sides could be playing still without troubling a scorer.
There comes a point where a club either backs its own ambition or admits it does not have any. Krylya Sovetov have paid $4.5M for Gilson Benchimol, which is the loudest way there is of saying which one it chose.
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at Astra is saying, and nobody at Krylya Sovetov is enjoying the guessing.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Krylya Sovetov this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Successful dribbles: 22. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
The terraces24 Aug 2026
Krylya Sovetov spend $4.5M on the signing the town wanted
It is the rarest sequence in football: supporters ask for something, and the club goes and does it. $4.5M for Gilson Benchimol, and for one week nobody is complaining about anything.
Krylya Sovetov asked and Grasshopper said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Krylya Sovetov have made the call to Nizhniy Novgorod. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
Krylya Sovetov and Akron have settled on $4.5M. The rest belongs to the player and his agent, and a supporter who has watched one of these before knows not to buy the shirt yet.
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at Lech is saying, and nobody at Krylya Sovetov is enjoying the guessing.
Fernando Costanza 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.
Krylya Sovetov asked and Haladas said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
The system has changed and his position has not. A footballer can improve his form; he cannot improve the manager’s formation, and that is the whole of the problem.
10 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.
Atlanta United FC wanted more than $11.6M and the board would not go there. Walked away, for now, which in a transfer window means until somebody blinks.
Krylya Sovetov have gone to Akron 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.
Krylya Sovetov asked and Ural said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Krylya Sovetov have done the hard part with Lech, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
He is 20 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.
$8.5M on the table at Atlanta United FC. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
Player ratings3 Aug 2026
Vadim Rakov, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 7.68
A mark of 7.68 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.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Ivan Ignatjev is living that version at Krylya Sovetov, and it tends to show in the first month.
“The easiest signature of my career.” Denis Makarov and Krylya Sovetov agree another 3 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Fernando Costanza 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. Ivan Ignatjev is a Krylya Sovetov player again, and the town has its story of the summer.
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.