From our football correspondent
Uneasy
The dugout19 Oct 2026
Denis Rudenok: that is not what I was promised
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Orsha have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Squad19 Oct 2026
Tempers go at Orsha
Evgeniy Sakuta 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 dugout19 Oct 2026
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Ivan Ageev, and the manager let it.
Squad19 Oct 2026
A row about effort at Orsha
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Raul Adygezalzade was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout19 Oct 2026
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 Zakhar Korenkov is on it.
Market19 Oct 2026
Orsha have made Maxim Makarov available for transfer. A career at this club is over in all but paperwork.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market12 Oct 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.
Market12 Oct 2026
Ivan Berezun has one foot out of the door
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Orsha they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad12 Oct 2026
Words exchanged at Orsha
Denis Khvostovich 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.
Market12 Oct 2026
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Viktar Signevich is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
The dugout12 Oct 2026
Ivan Berezun is still paying for one afternoon at Orsha
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.
The dugout12 Oct 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
Uneasy
Squad5 Oct 2026
A falling-out at Orsha
Gleb Zheleznikov and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Boardroom5 Oct 2026
Wages eat 200% of everything Orsha earn
There is a figure at which a wage bill stops being ambitious and becomes the reason nothing else is possible, and this club has reached it. Nothing is left over for a transfer, a stand or a rainy afternoon.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Words at Orsha training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Nikita Bobchenok 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.
Squad5 Oct 2026
10 new faces, and Orsha 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 dugout5 Oct 2026
Gleb Loyko has become a man the manager trusts
Nobody at Orsha 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.
Market5 Oct 2026
The list is a quiet document with a loud meaning. Sergey Chistyakov may talk to anybody who asks, and everybody at the club understands what that means.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market28 Sep 2026
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Orsha, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad28 Sep 2026
Words exchanged at Orsha
Gleb Zheleznikov 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 targets28 Sep 2026
The clock did what Vitebsk would not, and ended it. Supporters who watched the countdown will spend the next window doing it again.
The dugout28 Sep 2026
The manager makes an example of Andrey Romanov
“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.
The dugout28 Sep 2026
Ivan Berezun asks for a word with the manager
“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.
Squad28 Sep 2026
Questions about Gleb Zheleznikov on the training pitch
The standards have slipped, and in a building where everybody watches everybody it has not gone unremarked. This is how a player loses a place before he loses one.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market21 Sep 2026
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Orsha, and it is not being withdrawn.
Squad21 Sep 2026
Tempers go at Orsha
Gleb Zheleznikov 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 targets21 Sep 2026
Orsha ran out of time with Isloch. The paperwork was open when the deadline passed, and a transfer that was almost done is now a transfer that never happened.
The dugout21 Sep 2026
The manager makes an example of Artem Volodkov
“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.
The dugout21 Sep 2026
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 Zakhar Korenkov is on it.
The dugout21 Sep 2026
Ivan Berezun knocks on the manager’s door
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Ivan Berezun trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Market21 Sep 2026
3 months left and the two sides are nowhere near each other. Every week this drags on takes money off what Orsha could get for him.
Squad21 Sep 2026
The training reports on Sergey Chistyakov are not good
A bad Saturday is forgiven; a bad Tuesday is chosen. Standards have slipped and in a building where everybody watches everybody, it has been noticed.
Squad21 Sep 2026
The shrug has gone, the language is coming, and he now argues in training like somebody who expects to be here next year. Half a signing's value is this and none of it appears on a fee.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Market14 Sep 2026
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Orsha, and it is not being withdrawn.
Transfer targets14 Sep 2026
Orsha and Isloch have settled on $63.0K. 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.
Market14 Sep 2026
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Orsha is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Boardroom14 Sep 2026
Deadline passes with 18 signed and 3 gone
That is the business done at Orsha 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
21 days, the scan says, and scans are kinder than reality. The fixtures in that window have just become somebody else’s job.
Transfer targets14 Sep 2026
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Orsha have done the hard part with Neman, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
Squad14 Sep 2026
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Orsha this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Transfer targets14 Sep 2026
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Slutsk have kept their man, and Orsha go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Market14 Sep 2026
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Hleb Balanovich is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
In brief
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Market
One of our own: Hleb Makas joins the Orsha first team
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Squad
A row about effort at Orsha
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The dugout
The manager has not finished forgetting Ivan Berezun's mistake
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
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.
Transfer targets7 Sep 2026
The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: Lokomotiv Gomel keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.
Squad7 Sep 2026
A falling-out at Orsha
Evgeniy Sakuta and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Transfer targets7 Sep 2026
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Slonim have kept their man, and Orsha go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Squad7 Sep 2026
Abdulaziz Lawal 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.
Market7 Sep 2026
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Orsha, another week without a signature from Evgeniy Sakuta.
Squad7 Sep 2026
10 new faces, and Orsha 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 dugout7 Sep 2026
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.
Transfer targets7 Sep 2026
Neman have been asked whether they would lend him. Loans are agreed quickly or not at all, and this one will be one or the other by the weekend.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Market31 Aug 2026
Volna Pinsk come back empty-handed
The bid was some way short and Orsha did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Market31 Aug 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.
Match29 Aug 2026
The wait goes on for Orsha
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
Successful dribbles: 26. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Transfer targets31 Aug 2026
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at Minsk is saying, and nobody at Orsha is enjoying the guessing.
Transfer targets31 Aug 2026
$62.0K on the table at Lokomotiv Gomel. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
Squad31 Aug 2026
Words exchanged at Orsha
Evgeniy Sakuta 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.
Match29 Aug 2026
3 matches without a goal for Orsha
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.
Transfer targets31 Aug 2026
Orsha asked and Neman said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Market24 Aug 2026
Maxim Makarov hands in a written request
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Orsha can pretend not to have heard.
Player ratings24 Aug 2026
Successful dribbles: 26. 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.
Match22 Aug 2026
No end in sight to Orsha's wait for a win
5 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Orsha has to find a result from somewhere.
Transfer targets24 Aug 2026
Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at Molodechno is saying, and nobody at Orsha is enjoying the guessing.
Squad24 Aug 2026
A falling-out at Orsha
Denis Khvostovich and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Transfer targets24 Aug 2026
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Gomel have kept their man, and Orsha go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Match22 Aug 2026
Uni-X Labs left with the points after a 0‑2 defeat that will take some explaining on the terraces.
The dugout24 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.
Squad24 Aug 2026
A row about effort at Orsha
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Nikita Bobchenok was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match12 Aug 2026
Orsha bow out of the cup
Smorgon go through and Orsha go home, 3‑4 the scoreline that did it. The dressing room will call the league the priority now, because that is what dressing rooms say.
Match12 Aug 2026
Smorgon punish Orsha for switching off
2 goals to the good, and then a slow surrender of everything that had been earned. Zakhar Korenkov will not be the one blamed for it, but nobody at Orsha escapes the conversation that follows a collapse like this.
Player ratings17 Aug 2026
Marked 9.37 at 17, in a side that makes no allowances for age. He did not need any, and he looked the least nervous man on the pitch.
Squad17 Aug 2026
3 goals in one game. The first was taken well, the second was taken greedily, and by the third the crowd were simply waiting for him to get the ball.
Player ratings17 Aug 2026
Successful dribbles: 29. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Market17 Aug 2026
Only the photograph left for Ivan Berezun
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Ivan Berezun will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Orsha the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Match15 Aug 2026
4 matches without a win for Orsha
The run now stands at 4, and the questions being asked around Orsha are no longer polite ones.
Boardroom17 Aug 2026
The rules permit it and it stings anyway. Ivan Berezun has agreed terms with Slutsk for the summer, and until then he pulls on this shirt as a player who has already chosen his next one.
Squad17 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 Orsha this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Player ratings10 Aug 2026
Successful dribbles: 32. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Market10 Aug 2026
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Orsha can pretend not to have heard.
Squad10 Aug 2026
Words exchanged at Orsha
Gleb Zheleznikov 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.
Squad10 Aug 2026
Words at Orsha training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Abdulaziz Lawal 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.
Match8 Aug 2026
A bad afternoon for Orsha against Belshina
0‑2 to Belshina, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
Market10 Aug 2026
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Pavel Shikavka is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Market10 Aug 2026
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Yahor Palitsevich 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
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Vadzim Sivakov 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 dugout10 Aug 2026
The manager makes an example of Maxim Makarov
“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.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Squad3 Aug 2026
Evgeniy Sakuta 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. Evgeniy Sakuta has, at Orsha, and the first month will show what that does to a man.
Squad3 Aug 2026
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Pavel Bordukov and Orsha agree another 2 years.
Squad3 Aug 2026
A falling-out at Orsha
Gleb Zheleznikov and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad3 Aug 2026
A row about effort at Orsha
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Abdulaziz Lawal was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Match1 Aug 2026
Gleb Zheleznikov scored, and precious little else went right: 1‑2 to Lida, and a quiet walk to the dressing room.
Market3 Aug 2026
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Orsha, another week without a signature from Denis Khvostovich.
Market3 Aug 2026
Still no offer on the table, and Pavel Bordukov’s deal keeps shrinking. In boardroom language, silence this long stops being an oversight and starts being an answer.
The dugout3 Aug 2026
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Viktar Hleb after 1‑2, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
Transfer targets3 Aug 2026
A loan move for Denis Zakharov is in the works
Orsha have made the call to Vitebsk. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.