“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 The request is on a desk at Oleksandriya, and it is not being withdrawn.
Two goals and a mark of 8.91 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
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.
Oleksandr Pikhalionok 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 have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Oleksandriya can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
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.
“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 The request is on a desk at Oleksandriya, and it is not being withdrawn.
29 points, and the rest of the division looking up. Every side that finishes first spends the season pretending it is not thinking about it, and this one has started pretending.
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.
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.
Oleksandr Pikhalionok 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.
Inhulets will want this one forgotten quickly: 4‑1, every duel lost, and a long ride home. Oleksandriya were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.
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 7.54 for the rest of it.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Oleksandriya 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 Edson was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Two goals and a mark of 9.14 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Oleksandr Safronov 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.
Player ratings18 Oct 2027
Serhiy Buletsa was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.23. 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 3‑1, Oleh Yaremchuk could afford to be generous.
20 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Oleksandriya lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Oleksandriya can pretend not to have heard.
“The easiest signature of my career.” Artur Andreychyk and Oleksandriya agree another 4 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Oleksandriya, another week without a signature from Viktor Dolhyi.
“I respect the manager and I am not going to sit here and pretend I am happy.” It is the most common sentence in football and it has never once been the end of a story.
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 Oleksandriya, and both men came out saying it was fine.
30 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Oleksandriya 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 Oleksandriya, and it is not being withdrawn.
Oleksandr Pikhalionok 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.
Hard to beat is not the same as winning, but 6 matches without defeat is a foundation Oleksandriya did not have in the autumn.
Squad4 Oct 2027
Words at Oleksandriya training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Edson 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.
37 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Oleksandriya lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Oleksandriya is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Edson was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Oleksandriya this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
44 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Oleksandriya lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Oleksandriya can pretend not to have heard.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Metalurh Zaporizhzhia waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Oleksandriya is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
The deal that would have taken Serhiy Buletsa to Dynamo Kyiv has collapsed at the last stage, and he reports back to Oleksandriya with a summer to forget and a season still to play. Nobody is saying which side walked away.
Two of the goals had his name somewhere on them, which is the afternoon a manager wants from anybody asked to both create and finish. 7.98, and 2 involvements.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 18 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
Squad20 Sep 2027
Words at Oleksandriya training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Argyris Darelas 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.
Oleksandriya 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.
53 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Oleksandriya lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Dynamo Kyiv waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Oleksandriya is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
The terraces13 Sep 2027
The mood at Oleksandriya has turned into something else
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Oleksandriya can pretend not to have heard.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Bryan Castillo provided it, and the 8.90 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Boardroom13 Sep 2027
Deadline passes with 24 signed and 24 gone
That is the business done at Oleksandriya 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.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Oleksandriya heard it as anything else.
3 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 words a physio says slowly. 62 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.
“It was not right for me. I am not going to explain why to anybody except the people I owe an explanation to.” A deal agreed between two clubs, and a player who declined to be part of it.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Oleksandriya have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Oleksandr Pikhalionok 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 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 Oleksandriya know it.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Oleksiy Khoblenko and Oleksandriya agree another 2 years.
Oleksandriya asked and Foolad 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 words a physio says slowly. 69 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.
The offer from Kolos for Oleksandr Safronov 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.
“I listened, I thought about it, and I am staying. That is the whole story.” The clubs had agreed a fee. Taras Dmytruk had not agreed to go, which turned out to be the part that mattered.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Oleksandriya this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
79 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Oleksandriya lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Oleksandriya people have started saying his name in the past tense.
Oleksandr Safronov 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 Fernando Henrique was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Oleksandriya can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
“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 Oleksandriya, and 0 appearances in 8 say he has earned the hearing.
87 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Oleksandriya lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
The terraces16 Aug 2027
Supporters organise against the Oleksandriya board
A bad atmosphere can be waited out. A group of people meeting afterwards to decide what to do about it cannot, and everybody in the building knows which stage this is.
Victoriia Sumy will want this one forgotten quickly: 3‑0, every duel lost, and a long ride home. Oleksandriya were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.
“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 Oleksandriya, and it is not being withdrawn.
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.
Oleksandr Pikhalionok 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.
The words a physio says slowly. 96 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.
Ninety minutes of very little, and then everything at once. The winner arrived in the 86th, and Nyva spent what remained of the match appealing to the referee rather than chasing the ball.
“I know what people will say. I know what I want, and it is here.” Victoriia Sumy had the fee agreed and the shirt ready; they did not have the player, and now they will not.
“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 Oleksandriya 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 name of Dmytro Myshniov has come up in conversations Oleksandriya were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
104 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Oleksandriya lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
“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 Oleksandriya, 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 Oleksandriya this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
5 boys move up, and somewhere in the building the people who coached them at twelve are quietly having the best morning of their working year. Nothing about this shows up in a result and it is why the academy exists.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Fernando Henrique was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The words a physio says slowly. 112 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.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Oleksandriya have lost him in all but the paperwork.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Oleksandriya have done the hard part with Feniks, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
Oleksandr Safronov 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.
Squad26 Jul 2027
Words at Oleksandriya training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Fernando Henrique 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.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Artem Shulianskyi trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
He used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against Livyi Bereh in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Papa Ndiaga Yade signs something — a contract at Oleksandriya or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Supporters organise against the Oleksandriya board
A bad atmosphere can be waited out. A group of people meeting afterwards to decide what to do about it cannot, and everybody in the building knows which stage this is.
The words a physio says slowly. 119 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.
“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 Oleksandriya, and it is not being withdrawn.
He left as a boy and has come back still knowing where the away end is. Most signings have to be explained to a town; this one needed a photograph and nothing else.
Oleksandr Pikhalionok 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.
Oleksandriya 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.
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Denys Sliusar has his answer from Oleksandriya; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
126 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Oleksandriya lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
“I know what people will say. I know what I want, and it is here.” Anorthosis had the fee agreed and the shirt ready; they did not have the player, and now they will not.
“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 Oleksandriya, and it is not being withdrawn.
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.
Oleksandr Pikhalionok 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.
The name of Mateus Amaral has come up in conversations Oleksandriya were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Squad12 Jul 2027
Words at Oleksandriya training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Fernando Henrique 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.
135 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Oleksandriya lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
The club looked outside for a month, found nothing it preferred, and handed the job to the man who had been doing it anyway. He knows the building; now he has to prove he knows the rest.
Chernihiv have accepted the money. What Oleksandriya do not yet have is the man, and between here and the photograph is a conversation about wages that both sides are dreading.
“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; Oleksandriya are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Oleksandr Safronov 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.
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.
Karpaty paid $35.0K and Oleksandriya 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. Arka Gdynia have kept their man, and Oleksandriya go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
The words a physio says slowly. 144 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.
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Oleksandriya people have started saying his name in the past tense.
“It was not right for me. I am not going to explain why to anybody except the people I owe an explanation to.” A deal agreed between two clubs, and a player who declined to be part of it.
Some transfers need a press campaign. This one needed a shirt with the old number on it. Vikentiy Voloshyn is a Oleksandriya 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. Vikentiy Voloshyn is living that version at Oleksandriya, and it tends to show in the first month.
Squad28 Jun 2027
Words at Oleksandriya training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Fernando Henrique 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 has stopped being a mood in the stands and started being something organised. Boards can ignore a bad atmosphere for a long time; they cannot ignore this stage of it for very long at all.
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Oleksandriya people have started saying his name in the past tense.
“I listened, I thought about it, and I am staying. That is the whole story.” The clubs had agreed a fee. Chijioke Aniagboso had not agreed to go, which turned out to be the part that mattered.
Oleksandriya and Livyi Bereh have settled on $900.0K. 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.
The offer from Prykarpattia for Mateus Amaral 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 deal with UCSA 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.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Roman Savchenko is 18, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
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 Oleksandriya, and it is not being withdrawn.
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Oleksandriya hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Oleksandriya this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad14 Jun 2027
Words at Oleksandriya training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Fernando Henrique 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.
13 days since the seat came open, a list of names doing the rounds, and nobody has signed anything. Every week this drags on the shortlist gets shorter.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Dmytro Rebrov 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.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Ruslan Sobol 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.
Something was said to Papa Ndiaga Yade and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Oleksandriya, and both men came out saying it was fine.
The arithmetic ran out, and everybody could see it coming from a distance. The hard summer starts now, and next season's fixtures will be full of unfamiliar names.
The end came on a Tuesday, as these things usually do: a short meeting, a shorter statement, and Nazariy Kravets clearing his office by noon. Football’s cruellest ritual, performed to schedule.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Oleksandriya can pretend not to have heard.
“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.
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Oleksandriya hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Oleksandriya can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
Oleksandr Safronov 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.
Squad7 Jun 2027
Words at Oleksandriya training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Fernando Henrique 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 are footballers who have a good season and footballers a season is remembered for, and the second kind get their names read out in a hall in the summer. Oleksandriya will be quietly delighted and privately nervous.
Oleksandr Safronov 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.
Squad31 May 2027
Words at Oleksandriya training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Fernando Henrique 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.
Supporters organise against the Oleksandriya board
A bad atmosphere can be waited out. A group of people meeting afterwards to decide what to do about it cannot, and everybody in the building knows which stage this is.
Oleksandr Pikhalionok 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.
7 goals in 15 games at Carabobo — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Oleksandriya updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Artem Liehostaiev trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
4 shut-outs in 9 games. A goalkeeper’s loan is judged on the afternoons when nothing happened at all, and Chijioke Aniagboso has been having a lot of them.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Oleksandriya 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.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Oleksandriya know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
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 language is arriving, the jokes are landing, and there is somebody at the next peg to talk to. None of it appears in a scouting report and all of it shows up on the pitch.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Fernando Henrique was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
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 Hussayn Touati has written the date down.
Oleksiy Khoblenko has been around long enough to know what the spring feels like when it goes wrong, and he can feel it. A dressing room that is frightened plays like one.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Oleksandriya, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Nobody upstairs has said anything, which is the loudest thing they could do. Results buy silence in this game; the account at Oleksandriya is running low.
The board’s statement ran to three sentences and one of them mentioned results. Nazariy Kravets has managed long enough to translate: win soon, or the next statement is shorter.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Oleksandriya have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
“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 Oleksandriya know it.
Squad3 May 2027
Words at Oleksandriya training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Fernando Henrique 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 squad has men who were signed by a particular manager and men who were merely inherited. Oleksandr Pikhalionok is in the first group, and the man who wanted him here is no longer in the building.
“I respect the manager and I am not going to sit here and pretend I am happy.” It is the most common sentence in football and it has never once been the end of a story.
Supporters organise against the Oleksandriya board
A bad atmosphere can be waited out. A group of people meeting afterwards to decide what to do about it cannot, and everybody in the building knows which stage this is.
Oleksiy Khoblenko and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad26 Apr 2027
Words at Oleksandriya training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Fernando Henrique 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.
9 appearances at Stal Mielec and the goals have stopped going in. Oleksandriya lent out a goalkeeper and are watching somebody else’s season get better every week.
3 goals in 11 games at Carabobo — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Oleksandriya updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.
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 Myshniov has written the date down.
Position 15 and 17 points, and the table gets read bottom-up in this part of town. The calendar has stopped being a schedule and started being a countdown.
Fernando Henrique 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.
“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 Apr 2027
Words at Oleksandriya training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Patrick Obermüller 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.
Nothing in writing and nothing in public: a word about playing time, given face to face at Oleksandriya. The team sheets over the next month will show whether it was worth having.
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 table has started to be checked before the results are in, and that is always the tell. Nobody at Oleksandriya says the word out loud, and everybody in the building is thinking it.
Nothing in writing and nothing in public: a word about playing time, given face to face at Oleksandriya. The team sheets over the next month will show whether it was worth having.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 19 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
The club looked outside for a month, found nothing it preferred, and handed the job to the man who had been doing it anyway. He knows the building; now he has to prove he knows the rest.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Oleksandriya 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 Oleksandriya 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.
Nothing resets a career like somebody arriving who did not pick the side last season. Oleksandr Pikhalionok has taken the hint, and Oleksandriya are getting a version of him the previous regime had stopped seeing.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Ostap Prytula trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
The mood at Oleksandriya has turned into something else
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Oleksandriya 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 Oleksandriya this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 18 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Fernando Henrique was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 37 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Zorya go through and Oleksandriya go home, 1‑3 the scoreline that did it. The dressing room will call the league the priority now, because that is what dressing rooms say.
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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Fernando Henrique was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 1‑3, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Oleksandriya will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 9 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
14 days since the seat came open, a list of names doing the rounds, and nobody has signed anything. Every week this drags on the shortlist gets shorter.
Squad15 Mar 2027
Words at Oleksandriya training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Fernando Henrique 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 point is a point and I will take it, but we should have had all three.” Ivan Stepanenko after the 0‑0 draw, and the sentence every manager in the country said at some stage this weekend.
The end came on a Tuesday, as these things usually do: a short meeting, a shorter statement, and Andriy Harmash clearing his office by noon. Football’s cruellest ritual, performed to schedule.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Oleksandriya will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
9 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.
“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.
1 for Oleksandr Pikhalionok, marked 7.70, 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.
The offer from Kryvbas for Denys Sliusar 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 deal that would have taken Andrii Klishchuk to Kolos has collapsed at the last stage, and he reports back to Oleksandriya with a summer to forget and a season still to play. Nobody is saying which side walked away.
Oleksiy Khoblenko 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.
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 has stopped being a mood in the stands and started being something organised. Boards can ignore a bad atmosphere for a long time; they cannot ignore this stage of it for very long at all.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Oleksandriya will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Oleksandriya have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
The deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 4 arrived, 4 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed one.
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at Schalke 04 is saying, and nobody at Oleksandriya is enjoying the guessing.
“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 Oleksandriya know 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 Oleksandriya 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 Fernando Henrique was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 67 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
$10.1M was the most the club would pay and Shakhtar were asking for more. Deals like this are revived in the last week of a window roughly half the time, and everybody involved knows it.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Oleksandriya can pretend not to have heard.
This is not cover and nobody is pretending it is. $1.5M has been paid because Artem Liehostaiev is straightforwardly better than what was already here, and the club has decided to stop waiting.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Oleksandriya will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
The clubs have shaken hands with Shakhtar; the player has not yet. Personal terms are next, and personal terms are where more deals die than anybody prints.
2 goals to the good, and then a slow surrender of everything that had been earned. Jota Pereira will not be the one blamed for it, but nobody at Oleksandriya escapes the conversation that follows a collapse like this.
The chase for Oleksandr Pikhalionok ended with $10.9M changing hands and Dynamo Kyiv out of reasons to say no. The supporters will judge the fee the only way that matters: on Saturdays.
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Oleksandriya people have started saying his name in the past tense.
Two goals and a mark of 8.21 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 Oleksandriya, and it is not being withdrawn.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Oleksandriya will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
Everything agreed with Dynamo Kyiv, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
Oleksandriya 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.
5 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
Oleksandr Safronov 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.
It has stopped being a mood in the stands and started being something organised. Boards can ignore a bad atmosphere for a long time; they cannot ignore this stage of it for very long at all.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Oleksandriya will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Oleksandriya have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Oleksandriya 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.
Position 15 and 13 points, and the table gets read bottom-up in this part of town. The calendar has stopped being a schedule and started being a countdown.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Oleksandriya have lost him in all but the paperwork.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Oleksandriya 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.
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.
A player who expected to start watched it instead. The manager will call it a decision for the team; Hussayn Touati will call it something else in private.
A goalkeeper’s error has no defender behind it to tidy it away. He knew before the ball crossed the line, the crowd knew a second later, and there is nothing anybody can say tonight.
The offer from Táborsko for Chijioke Aniagboso 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.
7.76, 1 on the scoresheet, and the specific comedy of a back-four player celebrating like somebody who does this every week. He does not, and that is exactly why the ground reacted the way it did.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Fernando Henrique was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
100 times in these colours, in all weathers and under four or five different managers. That kind of service is quietly disappearing from the game.
The dugout18 Jan 2027
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 Andriy Harmash left the room before anybody could ask which.
Nobody at Oleksandriya 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.
Kryvbas next, and one man in the Oleksandriya dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought of him.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Roman Tolochko provided it, and the 8.12 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody 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 Oleksandriya this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad11 Jan 2027
Words at Oleksandriya training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Argyris Darelas 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.
Supporters organise against the Oleksandriya board
A bad atmosphere can be waited out. A group of people meeting afterwards to decide what to do about it cannot, and everybody in the building knows which stage this is.
Nobody upstairs has said anything, which is the loudest thing they could do. Results buy silence in this game; the account at Oleksandriya is running low.
What was said behind closed doors has now been said in front of a microphone. Everybody at Oleksandriya can do the arithmetic, including the man it is aimed at.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the whole of the defence. 6 saves, several of them the kind nobody expects to see made, and ten outfield players who owe him a drink.
“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Oleksandriya can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.
Fernando Henrique 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.
At 18 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.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 23 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
Squad28 Dec 2026
Words at Oleksandriya training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Fernando Henrique 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.
Yurii Kopyna 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.
Marked 7.87. Ask anyone leaving the ground what settled it and you will get one name, which is the only award that has ever really counted.
The dugout28 Dec 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.” Andriy Harmash kept it short after the 1‑0 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.
Oleksandr Safronov 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 Fernando Henrique was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Andriy Harmash after 0‑1, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
Rukh next, and one man in the Oleksandriya dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought of him.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Papa Ndiaga Yade signs something — a contract at Oleksandriya or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Successful dribbles: 18. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad14 Dec 2026
Words at Oleksandriya training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Patrick Obermüller 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 dugout14 Dec 2026
The manager’s verdict
“That is on me. I pick the team and I picked wrong.” Managers say that when they mean it and when they need to be seen to, and after 1‑2 Andriy Harmash left the room before anybody could ask which.
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Dmytro Myshniov, and the manager let it.
The dugout14 Dec 2026
Somebody else is better right now than Oleh Kudryk
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.
Ninety specific minutes wanted a different sort of player, and the manager picked one. He is not out of form and he is not in the side, and both are true.
Supporters organise against the Oleksandriya board
A bad atmosphere can be waited out. A group of people meeting afterwards to decide what to do about it cannot, and everybody in the building knows which stage this is.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Oleksandriya have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Fernando Henrique was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Viktor Dolhyi and Oleksandriya agree another 4 years.
They paid twice — for the ticket and for the journey — and got a 3-1 win for it. Away support is the truest kind precisely because nothing about it is convenient.
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.
“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; Oleksandriya are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Fernando Henrique 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.
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.
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.
Position 15, 7 points, and every result so far reduced to one line. The second half of the season starts with the same squad and a different set of expectations.
“A point is a point and I will take it, but we should have had all three.” Andriy Harmash after the 0‑0 draw, and the sentence every manager in the country said at some stage this weekend.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the whole of the defence. 8 saves, several of them the kind nobody expects to see made, and ten outfield players who owe him a drink.
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 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 dugout23 Nov 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 0‑1 defeat, delivered by Andriy Harmash to a room that had heard them before.
Squad23 Nov 2026
6 new faces, and Oleksandriya 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.
Oleksandr Safronov 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 Fernando Henrique was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
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.
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.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Oleh Kudryk’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Oleksandriya needing him to play as if none of it matters.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Andrii Storchous provided it, and the 9.34 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
The hardest thing about being 18 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Ihor Ustynov did not need any: 7.76, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Fernando Henrique 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.
7 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Oleksandriya and Chornomorets in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
He is 18 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.
“The easiest signature of my career.” Patrick Obermüller and Oleksandriya agree another 3 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Position 14 and 6 points, and the table gets read bottom-up in this part of town. The calendar has stopped being a schedule and started being a countdown.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Oleksandriya, another week without a signature from Oleksandr Safronov.
Squad2 Nov 2026
Denys Sliusar 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.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Andriy Harmash after 0‑2, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
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.
Somebody watched every match in the division at the weekend and decided he was the best thing in any of them. A small honour, and most careers end without one.
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.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Papa Ndiaga Yade. 2‑0 against Kudrivka, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
16 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.
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.
“We earned that. I asked them for a reaction and I got one, and now I want the same again on Saturday.” Andriy Harmash on a 2‑0 afternoon that pleased him more than he was prepared to show.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 21 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
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 easiest signature of my career.” Abdallah Aberkane and Oleksandriya agree another 3 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
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.
A 1‑1 draw with Obolon leaves the dressing room somewhere between relief and regret.
The dugout19 Oct 2026
The manager’s verdict
“I am frustrated, honestly. We did enough to win and we did not win.” Andriy Harmash was not hiding it after 1‑1, and nobody in the Oleksandriya dressing room was either.
Ninety specific minutes wanted a different sort of player, and the manager picked one. He is not out of form and he is not in the side, and both are true.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Daniil Vashchenko is 21, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Fernando Henrique was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Oleksandr Kozak’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Oleksandriya needing him to play as if none of it matters.
Nobody at Oleksandriya 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. Oleksandriya know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Daniil Vashchenko trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Oleksandr Safronov and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Words at Oleksandriya training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Fernando Henrique 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 has re-ordered his thinking and Denys Sliusar 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.
“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 Oleksandriya know it.
Fernando Henrique 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
Words at Oleksandriya training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Argyris Darelas 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.
15 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.
It finished 1‑1, and it somehow always looked like it would. One of those afternoons where the table moves less than the tempers.
The dugout28 Sep 2026
The manager’s verdict
“I am frustrated, honestly. We did enough to win and we did not win.” Andriy Harmash was not hiding it after 1‑1, and nobody in the Oleksandriya dressing room was either.
In brief
The dugoutOleh Kudryk dropped after a run of poor form
3 goals to the good, and then a slow surrender of everything that had been earned. Papa Ndiaga Yade will not be the one blamed for it, but nobody at Oleksandriya escapes the conversation that follows a collapse like this.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Papa Ndiaga Yade provided it, and the 8.99 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
1 for Fernando Henrique, marked 7.82, 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 Oleksandriya this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Artur Andreychyk is 21, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Denys Sliusar was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
0‑3 against Zorya, and no complaints that would survive the replay. The manager spoke about character afterwards; the terraces used shorter words.
Boardroom14 Sep 2026
Deadline passes with 6 signed and 1 gone
That is the business done at Oleksandriya 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Oleksandriya 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 Fernando Henrique was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Every shape has positions in it and this one does not have his. Oleksandriya will either change the shape, change his job, or change his club, and he is waiting to hear which.
There comes a point where a club either backs its own ambition or admits it does not have any. Oleksandriya have paid $880.0K for Chijioke Aniagboso, which is the loudest way there is of saying which one it chose.
Everything agreed with Nyíregyháza, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Fernando Henrique was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The manager has re-ordered his thinking and Yurii Kopyna 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.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Oleksandriya, another week without a signature from Oleksandr Safronov.
Nothing is announced when this happens and everybody knows. He is a bigger part of the plan at Oleksandriya than he was a month ago, and the training ground worked that out before the team sheet said so.
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 Jota Pereira is on it.
Oleksandriya and Chornomorets have settled on $880.0K. 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.
“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 Oleksandriya, and it is not being withdrawn.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Bukovyna have kept their man, and Oleksandriya go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
At 21 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 supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 0‑1, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Oleksandriya can pretend not to have heard.
Polissia did not want to sell and the number is why they did. $400.0K for Oleh Kudryk, and the expectation that arrives with him is the kind no amount of settling-in period softens.
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.
Oleksandriya offered $310.0K; Livyi Bereh 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.
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.
Oleksandriya offered $4.9M; Shakhtar 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.
Transfer targets17 Aug 2026
$400.0K settles it between the clubs for Oleh Kudryk
Polissia have accepted the money. What Oleksandriya do not yet have is the man, and between here and the photograph is a conversation about wages that both sides are dreading.
The number the board signed off was not enough. It has been asked again and raised its own offer to $333.8K — a club that wants Oleh Sokolov enough to be asked twice.
Oleksandriya had done everything except persuade the man himself. He stays at Hradec Králové, and the manager goes back to the drawing board with the money still in the bank.
$290.0K on the table at Livyi Bereh. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
Fernando Henrique 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.
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.
Add another name to the list: Polissia have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Viktor Dolhyi. The answer from Oleksandriya has not changed — yet.
In brief
SquadOleksandriya are still strangers to each other
Everything agreed with Hradec Králové, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.
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.
Boardroom10 Aug 2026
Nobody left the Oleksandriya 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.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Oleksandr Safronov has just signed for Oleksandriya, and for once the answer mattered.
“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 Oleksandriya know it.
Yurii Kopyna 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.
Oleksandriya asked and Jablonec said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
49 months to run and not a word offered. A club that lets the calendar negotiate for it usually ends up losing to the calendar.
The dugout3 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 Andriy Harmash left the room before anybody could ask which.