Spartak Moscow U21

3 Jan 2030
Thursday
Process
179 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

31 Dec 2029
From our football correspondent Triumph

Match

The derby belongs to Spartak Moscow

2‑0 against Zenit, and the songs went on long after the whistle. League positions come and go; days like this get retold at family dinners for years.

Squad

Defences have started doubling up on Pedro

26 goals and a season average of 7.43 will do that. The space he used to find has gone; he keeps scoring anyway, which is the mark of the real thing.

Player ratings

Pedro beats them one at a time

Successful dribbles: 30. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.

Match

Spartak Moscow make home a hard place to visit

14 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.

Player ratings

The derby has a name on it: Yuma Suzuki

Score against anybody else and it is a goal. Score against them and it is a story with your name in it for a decade, and Spartak Moscow supporters have already started telling it.

Match

Spartak Moscow make it 3 in a row

Momentum is a hard thing to buy and an easy thing to lose, and right now Spartak Moscow have 3 straight wins of it.

Squad

A falling-out at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.

Squad

A row about effort at Spartak Moscow

Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Yves Bissouma was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.

The dugout

No hiding place for Mirlind Daku

“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Mirlind Daku, and the manager let it.

In brief

  • The dugout Pedro has become a man the manager trusts
  • The dugout A satisfied Ruslan Petrov
  • The dugout Somebody else is better right now than Mirlind Daku
Back issues
178 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

24 Dec 2029
From our football correspondent Triumph

Squad

Manfred Ugalde is carrying Spartak Moscow

25 goals and a season average of 7.66. Form like that gets noticed well beyond this town.

Match

Pedro leads the rout of Dinamo Makhachkala

3‑0, and Pedro took the headlines on an afternoon when everything Spartak Moscow tried came off. Days like this are retold all winter.

Match

Spartak Moscow are in among the leaders

Position 2 and 56 points on the board. Nobody at the ground will say the word out loud yet, and everybody at the ground is thinking it.

Player ratings

A brace, and Pedro takes the afternoon — 8.33

There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Pedro provided it, and the 8.33 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.

The dugout

Vladislav Shitov: 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.” Spartak Moscow have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.

Player ratings

Age has not caught Yuma Suzuki yet — 7.80

At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 7.80 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.

Market

Only the photograph left for Alesson

Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Alesson will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Spartak Moscow the goodbyes have quietly begun.

Squad

Manfred Ugalde in a row with a teammate

It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Spartak Moscow this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.

Squad

Marquinhos 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.

In brief

177 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

17 Dec 2029
From our football correspondent Triumph

Squad

Defences have started doubling up on Manfred Ugalde

24 goals and a season average of 7.65 will do that. The space he used to find has gone; he keeps scoring anyway, which is the mark of the real thing.

Match

No mercy from Spartak Moscow

Akron will want this one forgotten quickly: 5‑0, every duel lost, and a long ride home. Spartak Moscow were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.

Squad

Manfred Ugalde takes the match ball home

3 goals in one afternoon from one man. The other players were also present, a witness confirmed.

Player ratings

Pedro scores twice — 8.32

Two goals and a mark of 8.32 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.

Match

The run at home goes on for Spartak Moscow

13 matches unbeaten here. Every visiting manager is asked about it in the week before, which is precisely why it keeps going.

Player ratings

Vintage Yuma Suzuki — 8.12

At 33 every good afternoon gets called a throwback, and this one was: 8.12, and nobody on the pitch better.

Market

Only the photograph left for Amir Saipi

Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Amir Saipi will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Spartak Moscow the goodbyes have quietly begun.

Market

Pablo Solari wants to know where this is going

“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 Spartak Moscow hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.

Player ratings

Manfred Ugalde was on a different afternoon to everybody else

10.00. 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.

In brief

176 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

10 Dec 2029
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Match

The longest week starts now for Spartak Moscow

Beaten 0‑2 by Dinamo Moscow in the one fixture that is never just a fixture. Work, school, the corner shop — there will be no getting away from this one.

Player ratings

Pedro runs at them all day

Successful dribbles: 31. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.

Squad

Pedro is carrying Spartak Moscow

22 goals and a season average of 7.39. Form like that gets noticed well beyond this town.

Match

After 12 games, Spartak Moscow finally taste it again

The first defeat in 12 matches. The manager will say it had to come; the dressing room will say it did not have to come against Dinamo Moscow; the supporters will say both, in that order, all week.

Market

Amir Saipi puts it in writing

“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Spartak Moscow, and it is not being withdrawn.

The dugout

Alexandr Koryakin keeps the receipts

“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Spartak Moscow may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.

Market

Yuma Suzuki wants to know where this is going

“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 Spartak Moscow hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.

Squad

Words exchanged at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde 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.

Squad

A row about effort at Spartak Moscow

Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Yves Bissouma was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.

In brief

175 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

3 Dec 2029
From our football correspondent Triumph

Match

Spartak Moscow silence Lokomotiv Moscow

A derby is never about the football alone, but the football helped: 3‑0, and the away end emptied early. Bragging rights renewed for another season.

Match

Spartak Moscow make it 12 in a row

Momentum is a hard thing to buy and an easy thing to lose, and right now Spartak Moscow have 12 straight wins of it.

Squad

Defences have started doubling up on Manfred Ugalde

21 goals and a season average of 7.60 will do that. The space he used to find has gone; he keeps scoring anyway, which is the mark of the real thing.

Match

Nobody wins at Spartak Moscow

12 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.

Market

Yves Bissouma wants to know where this is going

“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 Spartak Moscow hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.

Player ratings

A derby belongs to Yuma Suzuki

Beat anybody else and it is three points. Beat them and it is a story a city tells for a decade. Spartak Moscow have their man.

Squad

A falling-out at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.

Market

Spartak Moscow may not be able to give Gustavo Santos what he wants

It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Gustavo Santos wants continental football; whether Spartak Moscow can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.

Squad

A row about effort at Spartak Moscow

Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Marquinhos was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.

In brief

174 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

26 Nov 2029
From our football correspondent Triumph

Match

Spartak Moscow make it 11 in a row

Momentum is a hard thing to buy and an easy thing to lose, and right now Spartak Moscow have 11 straight wins of it.

Match

Spartak Moscow through in the cup

A 3‑0 win over Leningradets, and the draw for the next round can be watched with some interest for once.

Match

Spartak Moscow tear Ural apart

Rarely has this fixture seen a display like it: 4‑0 against Ural, and it could have been more.

Match

Spartak Moscow are in among the leaders

Position 2 and 47 points on the board. Nobody at the ground will say the word out loud yet, and everybody at the ground is thinking it.

Squad

Manfred Ugalde is carrying Spartak Moscow

20 goals and a season average of 7.58. Form like that gets noticed well beyond this town.

Player ratings

Vladislav Shitov scores twice — 8.74

Two goals and a mark of 8.74 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.

Squad

Manfred Ugalde takes the match ball home

3 goals in one afternoon from one man. The other players were also present, a witness confirmed.

The dugout

Nikita Iosifov keeps the receipts

“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Spartak Moscow may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.

Player ratings

Vintage Yuma Suzuki — 7.86

At 33 every good afternoon gets called a throwback, and this one was: 7.86, and nobody on the pitch better.

In brief

173 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

19 Nov 2029
From our football correspondent Triumph

Match

Spartak Moscow run riot against Torpedo Moscow

8‑1, and the margin flattered nobody — it could have carried another goal or two without complaint. Afternoons like this are why people keep coming.

Match

Spartak Moscow make it 9 in a row

Momentum is a hard thing to buy and an easy thing to lose, and right now Spartak Moscow have 9 straight wins of it.

Squad

A day Pablo Solari will not forget

4 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 ratings

A brace, and Pedro takes the afternoon — 8.36

There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Pedro provided it, and the 8.36 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.

The dugout

Mirlind Daku: 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.” Spartak Moscow have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.

Squad

Defences have started doubling up on Manfred Ugalde

17 goals and a season average of 7.51 will do that. The space he used to find has gone; he keeps scoring anyway, which is the mark of the real thing.

Market

Amir Saipi has one foot out of the door

Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Spartak Moscow they have already started talking about him in the past tense.

Squad

Home is on Yves Bissouma's mind

“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; Spartak Moscow are dealing with a man who wants a different country.

Match

Pablo Solari among the goals in a wild afternoon

9 goals in one match, Pablo Solari on the scoresheet, and a scoreline that will look like a misprint. Neutrals could not have asked more of Spartak Moscow and Torpedo Moscow.

In brief

  • Match Another one collected away from home
  • Squad A row about effort at Spartak Moscow
  • Player ratings Manfred Ugalde was on a different afternoon to everybody else
172 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

12 Nov 2029
From our football correspondent Triumph

Match

Spartak Moscow cannot stop winning

8 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.

Market

Amir Saipi puts it in writing

“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Spartak Moscow, and it is not being withdrawn.

Player ratings

Vintage Yuma Suzuki — 7.90

At 33 every good afternoon gets called a throwback, and this one was: 7.90, and nobody on the pitch better.

Squad

Defences have started doubling up on Pedro

18 goals and a season average of 7.30 will do that. The space he used to find has gone; he keeps scoring anyway, which is the mark of the real thing.

Market

Pablo Solari wants to know where this is going

“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 Spartak Moscow hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.

Squad

Words exchanged at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde 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.

Match

Nobody wins at Spartak Moscow

9 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.

Loan watch

Vsevolod Serov counts the days

“I watch every Spartak Moscow game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at SKA Khabarovsk runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.

The terraces

Spartak Moscow supporters have found a favourite in Pedro

There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Pedro has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.

In brief

171 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

5 Nov 2029
From our football correspondent Triumph

Player ratings

Pablo Solari beats them one at a time

Successful dribbles: 32. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.

Match

Spartak Moscow cannot stop winning

7 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 dugout

Ilja Lantratov: 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.” Spartak Moscow have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.

Player ratings

Vintage Yuma Suzuki — 8.35

At 33 every good afternoon gets called a throwback, and this one was: 8.35, and nobody on the pitch better.

Squad

Manfred Ugalde is carrying Spartak Moscow

16 goals and a season average of 7.45. Form like that gets noticed well beyond this town.

Market

Pedro wants to know where this is going

“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 Spartak Moscow hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.

Squad

Yves Bissouma signs a new deal

“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Yves Bissouma commits to Spartak Moscow for another 2 years.

Market

Marquinhos wants European nights

The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.

Squad

A falling-out at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.

In brief

170 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

29 Oct 2029
From our football correspondent Triumph

Match

Spartak Moscow up to position 2

35 points on the board and a place in the leading group. Nobody at the ground is saying the word out loud yet.

Match

Nobody wants to play Spartak Moscow right now

6 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.

Squad

Manfred Ugalde is in the form of his life

A season average of 7.44 with 15 goals behind it. Opponents have started planning around him, which is the sincerest compliment football pays.

Market

Alesson has one foot out of the door

Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Spartak Moscow they have already started talking about him in the past tense.

Squad

Yves Bissouma 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.

Squad

A falling-out at Spartak Moscow

Pablo Solari and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.

Match

Pedro sends Spartak Moscow past Akhmat

It finished 2‑0, and it was Pedro’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Spartak Moscow.

Match

Nobody wins at Spartak Moscow

8 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.

Player ratings

Ninety minutes of Pedro at his very best

Marked 8.26. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Spartak Moscow.

In brief

169 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

22 Oct 2029
From our football correspondent Triumph

Match

No mercy from Spartak Moscow

Nizhniy Novgorod will want this one forgotten quickly: 3‑0, every duel lost, and a long ride home. Spartak Moscow were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.

Player ratings

Manfred Ugalde scores twice — 8.97

Two goals and a mark of 8.97 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.

Squad

3 goals for Vladislav Sarveli

The match ball belongs to Vladislav Sarveli, whose 3 goals turned a difficult afternoon into a procession.

The dugout

Júlio Romão: 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.” Spartak Moscow have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.

Match

Spartak Moscow make it 5 in a row

Momentum is a hard thing to buy and an easy thing to lose, and right now Spartak Moscow have 5 straight wins of it.

Market

Only the photograph left for Amir Saipi

Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Amir Saipi will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Spartak Moscow the goodbyes have quietly begun.

Squad

Defences have started doubling up on Manfred Ugalde

14 goals and a season average of 7.41 will do that. The space he used to find has gone; he keeps scoring anyway, which is the mark of the real thing.

Squad

Tempers go at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.

Player ratings

Ninety minutes of Vladislav Sarveli at his very best

Marked 9.38. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Spartak Moscow.

In brief

168 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

15 Oct 2029
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Match

Manfred Ugalde leads the rout of Krylya Sovetov

3‑0, and Manfred Ugalde took the headlines on an afternoon when everything Spartak Moscow tried came off. Days like this are retold all winter.

Player ratings

Both of them Manfred Ugalde's — 9.08

2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 9.08, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.

Market

Amir Saipi asks to leave Spartak Moscow

“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.

The dugout

Nikita Iosifov keeps the receipts

“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Spartak Moscow may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.

Match

Spartak Moscow cannot stop winning

4 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.

Market

Pablo Solari wants to know where this is going

“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 Spartak Moscow hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.

Squad

Defences have started doubling up on Pedro

16 goals and a season average of 7.21 will do that. The space he used to find has gone; he keeps scoring anyway, which is the mark of the real thing.

Squad

Words exchanged at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde 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.

Squad

A row about effort at Spartak Moscow

Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Yves Bissouma was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.

In brief

167 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

8 Oct 2029
From our football correspondent Triumph

Match

The derby belongs to Spartak Moscow

3‑0 against CSKA Moscow, and the songs went on long after the whistle. League positions come and go; days like this get retold at family dinners for years.

Squad

4 goals for Gustavo Santos

The match ball belongs to Gustavo Santos, whose 4 goals turned a difficult afternoon into a procession.

Match

Spartak Moscow through in the cup

A 6‑0 win over Cherepovets, and the draw for the next round can be watched with some interest for once.

Player ratings

A derby belongs to Pedro

Beat anybody else and it is three points. Beat them and it is a story a city tells for a decade. Spartak Moscow have their man.

Player ratings

Vintage German Onugkha — 8.48

At 33 every good afternoon gets called a throwback, and this one was: 8.48, and nobody on the pitch better.

The dugout

German Onugkha keeps the receipts

“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Spartak Moscow may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.

Match

Spartak Moscow cannot stop winning

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.

Market

Victor Parada raises the bar for Spartak Moscow

“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Spartak Moscow heard it as anything else.

Match

Gustavo Santos among the goals in a wild afternoon

6 goals in one match, Gustavo Santos on the scoresheet, and a scoreline that will look like a misprint. Neutrals could not have asked more of Spartak Moscow and Cherepovets.

In brief

166 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

1 Oct 2029
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Match

Spartak Moscow run riot against Fakel

5‑0, and the margin flattered nobody — it could have carried another goal or two without complaint. Afternoons like this are why people keep coming.

Match

Spartak Moscow refuse to drop out of the race

Position 2, 23 points, and the result everyone checks first is now theirs. The word is still not being said around the ground, which is how you know everyone is thinking it.

Player ratings

Manfred Ugalde scores twice — 9.15

Two goals and a mark of 9.15 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.

Player ratings

Pedro scores twice — 8.34

Two goals and a mark of 8.34 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.

The dugout

Vladislav Shitov keeps the receipts

“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Spartak Moscow may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.

Player ratings

Yuma Suzuki, 33, rolls back the years — 8.63

There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.63 at 33, and nobody on the pitch was better.

Market

Alesson is on his way

The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Spartak Moscow is pretending he will be back in the shirt.

Squad

Manfred Ugalde in a row with a teammate

It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Spartak Moscow this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.

Squad

A row about effort at Spartak Moscow

Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Victor Parada was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.

In brief

165 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

24 Sep 2029
From our football correspondent Steady

The dugout

Igor Leschuk keeps the receipts

“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Spartak Moscow may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.

Market

Only the photograph left for Amir Saipi

Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Amir Saipi will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Spartak Moscow the goodbyes have quietly begun.

Squad

Tempers go at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde 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.

Squad

Words at Spartak Moscow training over how hard people work

Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Yves Bissouma 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.

Market

Marquinhos wants to know where this is going

“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 Spartak Moscow hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.

Market

Gustavo Santos has his eye on Europe

It is not a grievance and it is not a demand: he wants to play continental football, and he has stopped hiding it. Whether Spartak Moscow can give him that is a question about the club, not about him.

The dugout

The manager makes an example of Júlio Romão

“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 dugout

Pedro gets picked when it counts

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 Pedro is on it.

The dugout

Ruslan Petrov on the point

“A point is a point and I will take it, but we should have had all three.” Ruslan Petrov after the 0‑0 draw, and the sentence every manager in the country said at some stage this weekend.

In brief

164 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

17 Sep 2029
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Match

A derby to forget for Spartak Moscow

Beaten 0‑1 by Zenit in the one fixture where losing is not allowed. The football was bad enough; the week ahead will be worse.

Market

Amir Saipi 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 Spartak Moscow can pretend not to have heard.

The dugout

Alexandr Koryakin: 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.” Spartak Moscow have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.

Squad

Yves Bissouma wants to go home

“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Spartak Moscow can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.

Squad

Words exchanged at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde 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.

Squad

Words at Spartak Moscow training over how hard people work

Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Yves Bissouma 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.

Market

Pablo Solari raises the bar for Spartak Moscow

“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Spartak Moscow heard it as anything else.

Market

Mirlind Daku has his eye on Europe

It is not a grievance and it is not a demand: he wants to play continental football, and he has stopped hiding it. Whether Spartak Moscow can give him that is a question about the club, not about him.

The dugout

A promise honoured for Pedro

It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Spartak Moscow told Pedro something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.

In brief

  • The dugout No hiding place for Marquinhos
  • Squad Spartak Moscow are still strangers to each other
  • The dugout The manager’s verdict
163 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

10 Sep 2029
From our football correspondent Triumph

Match

Spartak Moscow tear Dinamo Makhachkala apart

Rarely has this fixture seen a display like it: 7‑0 against Dinamo Makhachkala, and it could have been more.

Squad

Pedro takes the match ball home

4 goals in one afternoon from one man. The other players were also present, a witness confirmed.

Market

Vladislav Shitov has said yes to Maccabi Haifa

The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Spartak Moscow have lost him in all but the paperwork.

Market

Ilja Samoshnikov 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 Spartak Moscow can pretend not to have heard.

Player ratings

Up for the corner, and Nail Umyarov delivers — 7.97

Centre-halves are allowed forward twice a season and are judged on what they do when they get there. Nail Umyarov scored, was marked 7.97, and got back before anybody noticed he had gone.

Boardroom

Window shuts: 24 in, 15 out at Spartak Moscow

The deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 24 arrived, 15 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed one.

Market

Ural come back empty-handed

The bid was some way short and Spartak Moscow did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.

Boardroom

Alesson has agreed to leave Spartak Moscow for nothing

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.

Match

7 unbeaten for Spartak Moscow

Hard to beat is not the same as winning, but 7 matches without defeat is a foundation Spartak Moscow did not have in the autumn.

In brief

162 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

3 Sep 2029
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Player ratings

Vladislav Sarveli scores twice — 8.96

Two goals and a mark of 8.96 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.

Market

Igor Dmitriev asks to leave Spartak Moscow

“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.

Market

Spartak Moscow turn down Lokomotiv Moscow for Igor Dmitriev

The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.

Player ratings

Yuma Suzuki, 33, rolls back the years — 7.81

There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 7.81 at 33, and nobody on the pitch was better.

Market

Alesson has one foot out of the door

Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Spartak Moscow they have already started talking about him in the past tense.

Market

Yves Bissouma wants to know where this is going

“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 Spartak Moscow hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.

Transfer targets

Alexandr Selikhov will not be coming to Spartak Moscow

Terms were offered and declined. Whether it was the wages, the role or the town, nobody at Ural is saying, and nobody at Spartak Moscow is enjoying the guessing.

Squad

Manfred Ugalde in a row with a teammate

It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Spartak Moscow this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.

Squad

Words at Spartak Moscow training over how hard people work

Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Yves Bissouma 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.

In brief

161 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

27 Aug 2029
From our football correspondent Triumph

Match

Spartak Moscow silence Dinamo Moscow

A derby is never about the football alone, but the football helped: 2‑0, and the away end emptied early. Bragging rights renewed for another season.

Match

Nobody wants to play Spartak Moscow right now

5 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.

Player ratings

Manfred Ugalde wins the derby

There are goals, and then there are goals against that particular opponent. The Spartak Moscow support have their bragging rights for a year and they know exactly whose name is on them.

Market

Hellas Verona come back empty-handed

The bid was some way short and Spartak Moscow did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.

Player ratings

Pedro runs at them all day

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.

The dugout

Sebastián Arce keeps the receipts

“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Spartak Moscow may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.

Market

Only the photograph left for Amir Saipi

Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Amir Saipi will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Spartak Moscow the goodbyes have quietly begun.

Transfer targets

Spartak Moscow make their move for Alexandr Selikhov

$220.0K on the table at Ural. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.

Market

Igor Dmitriev and the phone call Spartak Moscow dreaded

Interest from Lokomotiv Moscow is the one kind Spartak Moscow cannot discuss calmly. The player has said nothing; the supporters have said everything, most of it unprintable.

In brief

160 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

20 Aug 2029
From our football correspondent Triumph

Match

Spartak Moscow silence Lokomotiv Moscow

A derby is never about the football alone, but the football helped: 3‑0, and the away end emptied early. Bragging rights renewed for another season.

The dugout

Igor Leschuk: 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.” Spartak Moscow have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.

Match

Spartak Moscow make it 4 in a row

Momentum is a hard thing to buy and an easy thing to lose, and right now Spartak Moscow have 4 straight wins of it.

Transfer targets

Lucas Olaza turns down Spartak Moscow

The clubs had agreed and the player had not. A snub, and a public one: Krasnodar keep him, and the supporters here are left wondering what he had heard about the place.

Player ratings

A derby belongs to Yuma Suzuki

Beat anybody else and it is three points. Beat them and it is a story a city tells for a decade. Spartak Moscow have their man.

Match

Another one collected away from home

5 on the bounce on the road for Spartak Moscow. The coaches leave early, arrive at unlovely grounds in the dark, and keep coming home with three points.

Market

Victor Parada wants to know where this is going

“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 Spartak Moscow hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.

Squad

Words exchanged at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde 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 targets

Ural tell Spartak Moscow: Alexandr Selikhov is not for sale

The approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.

In brief

159 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

13 Aug 2029
From our football correspondent Triumph

Match

Spartak Moscow tear Ural apart

Rarely has this fixture seen a display like it: 5‑0 against Ural, and it could have been more.

Market

Terms done: Amir Saipi is going

Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Ural waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Spartak Moscow is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.

Player ratings

Both of them Pedro's — 8.30

2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 8.30, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.

Player ratings

Age has not caught Yuma Suzuki yet — 8.16

At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.16 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.

The dugout

Alesson keeps the receipts

“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Spartak Moscow may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.

Squad

A move Kirill Pechenin would have made for nothing

There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Kirill Pechenin is living that version at Spartak Moscow, and it tends to show in the first month.

Market

As if he never left: Ilja Pomazun returns

Some transfers need a press campaign. This one needed a shirt with the old number on it. Ilja Pomazun is a Spartak Moscow player again, and the town has its story of the summer.

Match

Spartak Moscow make it 3 in a row

Momentum is a hard thing to buy and an easy thing to lose, and right now Spartak Moscow have 3 straight wins of it.

Market

Spartak Moscow get their man

The chase for Kirill Pechenin ended with $490.0K changing hands and Krylya Sovetov out of reasons to say no. The supporters will judge the fee the only way that matters: on Saturdays.

In brief

158 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

6 Aug 2029
From our football correspondent Triumph

Match

Spartak Moscow run riot against Torpedo Moscow

5‑0, and the margin flattered nobody — it could have carried another goal or two without complaint. Afternoons like this are why people keep coming.

Player ratings

A brace, and Vladislav Sarveli takes the afternoon — 8.78

There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Vladislav Sarveli provided it, and the 8.78 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.

Squad

Pedro takes the match ball home

3 goals in one afternoon from one man. The other players were also present, a witness confirmed.

The dugout

Igor Dmitriev says Spartak Moscow went back on their word

“I was told what my role would be, and I signed on that basis. It has not happened.” A grievance with a date attached is the hardest kind to settle.

Player ratings

Vintage Yuma Suzuki — 8.20

At 33 every good afternoon gets called a throwback, and this one was: 8.20, and nobody on the pitch better.

Market

Spartak Moscow get their man

The chase for Maizon Rodríguez ended with $2.4M changing hands and Krasnodar out of reasons to say no. The supporters will judge the fee the only way that matters: on Saturdays.

Market

Spartak Moscow get their man

The chase for Júlio Romão ended with $1.6M changing hands and Akhmat Grozny out of reasons to say no. The supporters will judge the fee the only way that matters: on Saturdays.

Transfer targets

Kirill Pechenin due for a Spartak Moscow medical

Everything agreed with Krylya Sovetov, everything agreed with the player; a doctor is the only person left to persuade. The photograph is a day or two away.

Squad

Júlio Romão gets the move he always wanted

Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Júlio Romão has just signed for Spartak Moscow, and for once the answer mattered.

In brief

157 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

30 Jul 2029
From our football correspondent Triumph

Match

Pedro leads the rout of Rostov

3‑0, and Pedro took the headlines on an afternoon when everything Spartak Moscow tried came off. Days like this are retold all winter.

Player ratings

Pedro scores twice — 8.19

Two goals and a mark of 8.19 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.

The dugout

Olakunle Olusegun keeps the receipts

“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Spartak Moscow may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.

Player ratings

Age has not caught Yuma Suzuki yet — 8.09

At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.09 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.

Market

Spartak Moscow turn down Hammarby for German Onugkha

The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.

Squad

A move Martin Kramarič would have made for nothing

There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Martin Kramarič is living that version at Spartak Moscow, and it tends to show in the first month.

Market

Spartak Moscow get their man

The chase for Martin Kramarič ended with $1.0M changing hands and Krylya Sovetov out of reasons to say no. The supporters will judge the fee the only way that matters: on Saturdays.

Market

Only the photograph left for Amir Saipi

Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Amir Saipi will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Spartak Moscow the goodbyes have quietly begun.

Transfer targets

Krylya Sovetov tell Spartak Moscow: Vladimir Ignatenko is not for sale

The approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.

In brief

156 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

23 Jul 2029
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Player ratings

Pedro beats them one at a time

Successful dribbles: 29. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.

Market

Artem Bykovskiy says no to Ufa

“I listened, I thought about it, and I am staying. That is the whole story.” The clubs had agreed a fee. Artem Bykovskiy had not agreed to go, which turned out to be the part that mattered.

Market

Spartak Moscow get their man

The chase for Iker Pozo ended with $3.8M changing hands and Krasnodar out of reasons to say no. The supporters will judge the fee the only way that matters: on Saturdays.

Market

Ítalo is a Spartak Moscow player

The fee is $2.1M, the contract is signed, and the argument about whether he is worth it can begin. Ural drove a hard bargain; time will say who won it.

Transfer targets

Rostov tell Spartak Moscow: Alexey Mironov is not for sale

The approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.

Market

Spartak Moscow get their man

The chase for Maxim Mukhin ended with $1.9M changing hands and Rostov out of reasons to say no. The supporters will judge the fee the only way that matters: on Saturdays.

Squad

A move Iker Pozo would have made for nothing

There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Iker Pozo is living that version at Spartak Moscow, and it tends to show in the first month.

Squad

Tempers go at Spartak Moscow

Gedson Fernandes 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.

Squad

Yves Bissouma 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.

In brief

155 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

16 Jul 2029
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Transfer targets

Fee done, terms next for Maxim Mukhin

Spartak Moscow and Rostov have settled on $1.9M. 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.

Transfer targets

Iker Pozo is a medical away from Spartak Moscow

The deal with Krasnodar 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.

Market

Vladislav Shitov comes home

The shirt still fits. Vladislav Shitov is back at Spartak Moscow, and half the ground remembers him in these colours already. Some signings need selling to the town; this one sold itself.

Squad

Vladislav Shitov 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. Vladislav Shitov has, at Spartak Moscow, and the first month will show what that does to a man.

Squad

Home is on Yves Bissouma's mind

“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; Spartak Moscow are dealing with a man who wants a different country.

Squad

A falling-out at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.

Boardroom

5 academy players handed senior numbers at Spartak Moscow

The morning the pathway stops being a brochure and becomes a team sheet. Most of them will not be here in three years; all of them have already done the hard part, which was getting to today.

Squad

Late improvement for Ruslan Litvinov

At 27 the improving is meant to be over, and it is not: 3 points better than a year ago. It happens to the ones who take the boring parts seriously.

Market

Mirlind Daku wants European nights

The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.

In brief

154 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

9 Jul 2029
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Market

Amir Saipi has said yes to Ural

The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Spartak Moscow have lost him in all but the paperwork.

Transfer targets

An offer of $3.6M for Vladislav Shitov

Spartak Moscow have gone to Krylya Sovetov with a bid, and the supporters have gone to the internet with an opinion about it. Whether either changes anything is up to the selling club.

Market

German Onugkha 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 Spartak Moscow can pretend not to have heard.

Squad

Dmitry Chistyakov 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. Dmitry Chistyakov has, at Spartak Moscow, and the first month will show what that does to a man.

Squad

Hendrik Bonmann signs a new deal

“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Hendrik Bonmann commits to Spartak Moscow for another 2 years.

Squad

Manfred Ugalde in a row with a teammate

It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Spartak Moscow this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.

Transfer targets

Spartak Moscow rebuffed over Igor Leschuk

Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Rubin have kept their man, and Spartak Moscow go back to a list with one name crossed off it.

Squad

A late step up for Christopher Wooh

At 27 the improving is meant to be over. It is not: 3 points better than the mark taken at the start of the year, which is the sort of thing that happens to players who take the boring parts of the job seriously.

Market

Marquinhos has his eye on Europe

It is not a grievance and it is not a demand: he wants to play continental football, and he has stopped hiding it. Whether Spartak Moscow can give him that is a question about the club, not about him.

In brief

153 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

2 Jul 2029
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Market

Spartak Moscow sign Maxim Borisko for $6.5M

The paperwork is done: Maxim Borisko joins from Akhmat Grozny in a deal worth $6.5M. Now comes the harder part.

Transfer targets

Door shut on Brian Mansilla

Spartak Moscow asked and Akhmat Grozny said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.

Transfer targets

$120.0K settles it between the clubs for Dmitry Chistyakov

Rostov have accepted the money. What Spartak Moscow do not yet have is the man, and between here and the photograph is a conversation about wages that both sides are dreading.

Squad

Maxim Borisko gets the move he always wanted

Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Maxim Borisko has just signed for Spartak Moscow, and for once the answer mattered.

Market

As if he never left: Nikolay Rasskazov returns

Some transfers need a press campaign. This one needed a shirt with the old number on it. Nikolay Rasskazov is a Spartak Moscow player again, and the town has its story of the summer.

Squad

Hendrik Bonmann signs on for more

“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Hendrik Bonmann and Spartak Moscow agree another 2 years.

Squad

Yuma Suzuki wants to go home

“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Spartak Moscow can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.

Squad

Tempers go at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde 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.

Market

Pablo Solari wants European nights

The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.

In brief

152 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

25 Jun 2029
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Transfer targets

$6.5M settles it between the clubs for Maxim Borisko

Akhmat Grozny have accepted the money. What Spartak Moscow do not yet have is the man, and between here and the photograph is a conversation about wages that both sides are dreading.

Transfer targets

Door shut on Dardan Shabanhaxhaj

Spartak Moscow asked and Rubin said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.

Market

Amir Saipi puts it in writing

“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Spartak Moscow, and it is not being withdrawn.

The dugout

Artem Kasimov says Spartak Moscow went back on their word

“I was told what my role would be, and I signed on that basis. It has not happened.” A grievance with a date attached is the hardest kind to settle.

Squad

A move Yaroslav Mikhailov would have made for nothing

There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Yaroslav Mikhailov is living that version at Spartak Moscow, and it tends to show in the first month.

Market

Pedro wants European nights

The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.

Market

Yaroslav Mikhailov is a Spartak Moscow player

The fee is $990.0K, the contract is signed, and the argument about whether he is worth it can begin. Rostov drove a hard bargain; time will say who won it.

Squad

Hendrik Bonmann 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.

Squad

Words exchanged at Spartak Moscow

Marquinhos 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.

In brief

151 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

18 Jun 2029
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Match

The view from the top for Spartak Moscow

77 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.

Transfer targets

Spartak Moscow bid $9.7M for Pavel Meleshin

The offer went to Krylya Sovetov this week and it is theirs to answer. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loud the door closes.

Transfer targets

Door shut on Moses Cobnan

Spartak Moscow asked and Krasnodar 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 dugout

Mirlind Daku keeps the receipts

“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Spartak Moscow may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.

Transfer targets

An offer of $990.0K for Yaroslav Mikhailov

Spartak Moscow have gone to Rostov with a bid, and the supporters have gone to the internet with an opinion about it. Whether either changes anything is up to the selling club.

Transfer targets

Spartak Moscow make their move for Vadim Uljanov

$470.0K on the table at Krylya Sovetov. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.

Squad

Hendrik Bonmann in a row with a teammate

It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Spartak Moscow this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.

Squad

Words at Spartak Moscow training over how hard people work

Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Pablo Solari 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 dugout

No hiding place for Igor Dmitriev

“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Igor Dmitriev, and the manager let it.

In brief

150 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

11 Jun 2029
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Market

Ferencvaros come back empty-handed

The bid was some way short and Spartak Moscow did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.

Market

Marquinhos raises the bar for Spartak Moscow

“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Spartak Moscow heard it as anything else.

Squad

Christopher Wooh signs on for more

“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Christopher Wooh and Spartak Moscow agree another 5 years.

Squad

Manfred Ugalde in a row with a teammate

It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Spartak Moscow this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.

Squad

A row about effort at Spartak Moscow

Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Hendrik Bonmann was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.

Squad

A quiet fortnight at Spartak Moscow

With 6 players away on international duty the sessions are small and the manager can actually hear himself. It is the one break in the season, and it never quite feels like one.

The dugout

The manager makes an example of Vladislav Saus

“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 dugout

Gedson Fernandes has become a man the manager trusts

Nobody at Spartak Moscow 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.

Market

Talks stall between Spartak Moscow and Nail Umyarov

“We are a long way apart, and pretending otherwise helps nobody.” Neither side is close, and the calendar is not on the club's side.

In brief

149 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

4 Jun 2029
From our football correspondent Triumph

Boardroom

Spartak Moscow lift the trophy

The season a town measures the next twenty against. The trophy comes home with the squad, and the route through the streets was agreed days ago.

Match

Nobody wins at Spartak Moscow

27 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.

Match

Spartak Moscow march on in the cup

Rostov are out and Spartak Moscow go through, 2‑0 the final word. The bracket opens up a little, and everyone allows themselves a look at it.

Player ratings

Gedson Fernandes scores twice — 8.30

Two goals and a mark of 8.30 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.

Match

Spartak Moscow cannot stop winning

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.

Squad

Pedro honoured for the season

The kind of year that ends with a name being read out in a hall. Spartak Moscow had the benefit of it every week and now have the problem of everybody else knowing.

Market

Frosinone come back empty-handed

The bid was some way short and Spartak Moscow did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.

Squad

Nail Umyarov has been here 10 seasons

270 appearances across 10 seasons in one shirt. Nobody builds a career like that on purpose any more; it happens to a certain kind of footballer at a certain kind of club.

Squad

Pablo Solari is carrying Spartak Moscow

13 goals and a season average of 7.50. Form like that gets noticed well beyond this town.

In brief

148 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

28 May 2029
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Squad

A knee injury of the worst kind for Christopher Martins Pereira

21 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Spartak Moscow lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.

Market

Amir Saipi 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 Spartak Moscow can pretend not to have heard.

Squad

A falling-out at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.

Squad

A row about effort at Spartak Moscow

Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Pablo Solari was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.

Market

Gustavo Santos wants European nights

The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.

Market

Alesson told to find a new club

“They were honest with me, and I would rather know.” Alesson has been informed he is not in the manager's thinking at Spartak Moscow.

The dugout

Pedro 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 Pedro trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.

The dugout

When it matters, Marquinhos plays

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.

Market

The Victor Parada story refuses to die

It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Victor Parada signs something — a contract at Spartak Moscow or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.

In brief

147 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

21 May 2029
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Squad

A knee injury of the worst kind for Christopher Martins Pereira

29 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Spartak Moscow lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.

Match

Spartak Moscow are top

77 points and nobody above them. The word is not being said around the ground yet, and it is being thought in every seat.

Squad

Words exchanged at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde 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.

Market

Victor Parada raises the bar for Spartak Moscow

“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Spartak Moscow heard it as anything else.

Market

Igor Dmitriev wants European nights

The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.

Squad

Marquinhos 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.

The dugout

Gustavo Santos gets it from the manager

“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.

The dugout

When it matters, Yuma Suzuki plays

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.

Market

The Manfred Ugalde question follows Spartak Moscow around

Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Manfred Ugalde’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.

In brief

146 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

14 May 2029
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Squad

A knee injury of the worst kind for Christopher Martins Pereira

37 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Spartak Moscow lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.

Market

Pedro wants more than Spartak Moscow are offering

“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.

Market

Spartak Moscow may not be able to give Marquinhos what he wants

It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Marquinhos wants continental football; whether Spartak Moscow can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.

Squad

Home is on Yves Bissouma's mind

“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; Spartak Moscow are dealing with a man who wants a different country.

Squad

Tempers go at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde 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.

Squad

A row about effort at Spartak Moscow

Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Pablo Solari was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.

The dugout

Manfred Ugalde gets picked when it counts

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 Manfred Ugalde is on it.

Market

The Christopher Martins Pereira story refuses to die

It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Christopher Martins Pereira signs something — a contract at Spartak Moscow or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.

The dugout

Gilson Benchimol 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 Gilson Benchimol trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.

In brief

145 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

7 May 2029
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Squad

The knee: Christopher Martins Pereira out for 44 days

44 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Spartak Moscow lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.

The dugout

Pedro says Spartak Moscow went back on their word

“I was told what my role would be, and I signed on that basis. It has not happened.” A grievance with a date attached is the hardest kind to settle.

Market

Alesson asks to leave Spartak Moscow

“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.

Market

Pablo Solari raises the bar for Spartak Moscow

“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Spartak Moscow heard it as anything else.

Squad

A falling-out at Spartak Moscow

Hendrik Bonmann and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.

Squad

A row about effort at Spartak Moscow

Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Pablo Solari was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.

Market

Spartak Moscow may not be able to give Mirlind Daku what he wants

It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Mirlind Daku wants continental football; whether Spartak Moscow can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.

Squad

A step back for Mirlind Daku at Spartak Moscow

Somebody has moved past him. It is not a dropping and it is worse than one, because a dropping is about a Saturday and this is about where he stands.

The dugout

Pablo Solari gets picked when it counts

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 Pablo Solari is on it.

In brief

144 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

30 Apr 2029
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Market

Amir Saipi puts it in writing

“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Spartak Moscow, and it is not being withdrawn.

Market

Pedro wants European nights

The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.

Squad

Home is on Yuma Suzuki's mind

“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; Spartak Moscow are dealing with a man who wants a different country.

Squad

A falling-out at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.

Squad

Marquinhos 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.

Boardroom

Ilja Lantratov will join Spartak Moscow for nothing

The paperwork is done long before the player is. Ilja Lantratov has agreed terms to come here when his current deal runs out, which means Spartak Moscow have spent a summer's transfer budget on a phone call.

The dugout

Marquinhos has become a man the manager trusts

Nobody at Spartak Moscow 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.

The dugout

No hiding place for Nikita Iosifov

“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Nikita Iosifov, and the manager let it.

The dugout

Nail Umyarov knocks on the manager's door

“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Spartak Moscow, and both men came out saying it was fine.

In brief

143 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

23 Apr 2029
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Match

The view from the top for Spartak Moscow

77 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.

Market

German Onugkha turns Orlando City down

“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.

Market

Marquinhos raises the bar for Spartak Moscow

“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Spartak Moscow heard it as anything else.

Market

Pablo Solari has his eye on Europe

It is not a grievance and it is not a demand: he wants to play continental football, and he has stopped hiding it. Whether Spartak Moscow can give him that is a question about the club, not about him.

Squad

Words exchanged at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde 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.

Squad

A row about effort at Spartak Moscow

Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Pablo Solari was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.

The dugout

Yuma Suzuki has become a man the manager trusts

Nobody at Spartak Moscow 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.

Market

The Manfred Ugalde question follows Spartak Moscow around

Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Manfred Ugalde’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.

The dugout

Nail Umyarov 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 Nail Umyarov trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.

In brief

142 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

16 Apr 2029
From our football correspondent Triumph

Match

Nobody wins at Spartak Moscow

26 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.

Match

Cup progress for Spartak Moscow

A 3‑1 win over CSKA Moscow, a place in the next round, and the quiet arithmetic every supporter does on the walk home: how many more until a final?

The dugout

Vladislav Saus: 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.” Spartak Moscow have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.

Match

Nobody wants to play Spartak Moscow right now

5 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.

Squad

Pablo Solari is carrying Spartak Moscow

13 goals and a season average of 7.50. Form like that gets noticed well beyond this town.

Player ratings

A derby belongs to Pablo Solari

Beat anybody else and it is three points. Beat them and it is a story a city tells for a decade. Spartak Moscow have their man.

Squad

Tempers go at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde 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.

Squad

Words at Spartak Moscow training over how hard people work

Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Pablo Solari 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 terraces

Spartak Moscow supporters have found a favourite in Pedro

There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Pedro has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.

In brief

  • The dugout The manager makes an example of Gustavo Santos
  • The dugout Manfred Ugalde has become a man the manager trusts
  • The dugout The view from the dugout
141 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

9 Apr 2029
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Market

Alesson puts it in writing

“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Spartak Moscow, and it is not being withdrawn.

The dugout

Artem Kasimov: 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.” Spartak Moscow have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.

Market

Spartak Moscow turn down Toronto FC for German Onugkha

The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.

Squad

Yves Bissouma stays put

“The easiest signature of my career.” Yves Bissouma and Spartak Moscow agree another 2 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.

Squad

Manfred Ugalde in a row with a teammate

It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Spartak Moscow this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.

Squad

Marquinhos 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.

The dugout

Pablo Solari has become a man the manager trusts

Nobody at Spartak Moscow 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.

Market

Still no ink between Spartak Moscow and Nail Umyarov

“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Spartak Moscow, another week without a signature from Nail Umyarov.

The dugout

Mirlind Daku 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 Mirlind Daku trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.

In brief

140 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

2 Apr 2029
From our football correspondent Upbeat

The dugout

Ruslan Litvinov: 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.” Spartak Moscow have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.

Market

Amir Saipi asks to leave Spartak Moscow

“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.

Market

Ismael is on his way

The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Spartak Moscow is pretending he will be back in the shirt.

Squad

Yves Bissouma stays put

“The easiest signature of my career.” Yves Bissouma and Spartak Moscow agree another 2 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.

Squad

A falling-out at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.

Squad

A row about effort at Spartak Moscow

Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Pablo Solari was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.

Squad

6 new faces, and Spartak Moscow 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 dugout

Marquinhos has become a man the manager trusts

Nobody at Spartak Moscow 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.

Market

A loan that did nothing for German Onugkha

4 appearances and 0 goals is not a season away, it is a year lost. He is back at Spartak Moscow no further forward, and everybody involved will explain why it was not their fault.

In brief

139 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

26 Mar 2029
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Match

Nobody above Spartak Moscow

First, on 77 points. The table is a fact and a fact is allowed to be enjoyed, which is as far as anybody at the club is prepared to go in public.

The dugout

Amir Saipi says Spartak Moscow went back on their word

“I was told what my role would be, and I signed on that basis. It has not happened.” A grievance with a date attached is the hardest kind to settle.

Squad

Words exchanged at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde 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.

Boardroom

Spartak Moscow to lose Ismael for free

There is no worse way to lose a footballer. Ismael has pre-agreed a move away, which means every appearance between now and June is made by a man the club can no longer sell, and somebody upstairs will be asked why the contract was allowed to get here.

Market

Victor Parada wants to know where this is going

“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 Spartak Moscow hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.

Squad

Pablo Solari 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.

Market

Gustavo Santos has his eye on Europe

It is not a grievance and it is not a demand: he wants to play continental football, and he has stopped hiding it. Whether Spartak Moscow can give him that is a question about the club, not about him.

Squad

International break empties Spartak Moscow

5 call-ups is a compliment to the squad and a headache for the man running it. He will get them back in a fortnight, tired, in various states of repair.

The dugout

Yuma Suzuki has become a man the manager trusts

Nobody at Spartak Moscow 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.

In brief

138 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

19 Mar 2029
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Squad

Words exchanged at Spartak Moscow

Pablo Solari 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.

Market

Igor Dmitriev wants European nights

The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.

Squad

Marquinhos 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.

Loan watch

Makar Vysochenko wants to come home

“I did not go to Akhmat Grozny to sit and watch. I want to come back to Spartak Moscow and fight for my place.” 7 appearances in 36 matches say the rest.

The dugout

Gustavo Santos gets it from the manager

“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.

The dugout

Manfred Ugalde has become a man the manager trusts

Nobody at Spartak Moscow 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.

Market

The Manfred Ugalde talk will not go away

Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Spartak Moscow know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.

The dugout

Mirlind Daku has been promised minutes

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 Mirlind Daku has written the date down.

Squad

Sebastián Arce has seen what the next man earns

Numbers do not stay secret in a dressing room and never have. He is not asking for more than he is worth; he is asking why somebody beside him is worth more, and at Spartak Moscow that is a harder question to answer.

In brief

137 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

12 Mar 2029
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Market

Yuma Suzuki wants to know where this is going

“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 Spartak Moscow hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.

Squad

Manfred Ugalde in a row with a teammate

It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Spartak Moscow this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.

Squad

Yves Bissouma wants one last season at home

Every long career reaches the week the last one is thought about. He would like it to be where he started, and Spartak Moscow know now that the thought has arrived.

Market

Mirlind Daku has his eye on Europe

It is not a grievance and it is not a demand: he wants to play continental football, and he has stopped hiding it. Whether Spartak Moscow can give him that is a question about the club, not about him.

Squad

A row about effort at Spartak Moscow

Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Pablo Solari was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.

The dugout

No hiding place for Igor Dmitriev

“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Igor Dmitriev, and the manager let it.

Loan watch

Sebastiano Nava wants to come home

“I did not go to Kashima Antlers to sit and watch. I want to come back to Spartak Moscow and fight for my place.” 0 appearances in 5 matches say the rest.

The dugout

Pablo Solari gets picked when it counts

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 Pablo Solari is on it.

Market

Spartak Moscow and Nail Umyarov are talking past each other

“There is a gap, and pretending there is not helps nobody.” Neither side has moved, and the calendar is working for exactly one of them.

In brief

136 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

5 Mar 2029
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Squad

The knee: Andrey Kuzin out for 15 days

15 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Spartak Moscow lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.

Market

Amir Saipi 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 Spartak Moscow can pretend not to have heard.

Transfer targets

Nizhniy Novgorod tell Spartak Moscow: Dmitry Vorobjov is not for sale

The approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.

Market

Marquinhos wants to know where this is going

“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 Spartak Moscow hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.

Market

Pedro wants European nights

The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.

Squad

A falling-out at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.

Squad

Christopher Martins Pereira signs on for more

“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Christopher Martins Pereira and Spartak Moscow agree another 2 years.

Squad

A row about effort at Spartak Moscow

Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Pablo Solari was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.

The dugout

The manager makes an example of Yves Bissouma

“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.

In brief

135 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

26 Feb 2029
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Match

Nobody wins at Spartak Moscow

25 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.

Squad

Andrey Kuzin damages knee ligaments — 25 days out

The words a physio says slowly. 25 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.

Match

Gilson Benchimol sends Spartak Moscow through

Cup ties wait for somebody to seize them, and Gilson Benchimol obliged against Akhmat. 3‑1 on the night, and the name in the next round’s hat is Spartak Moscow.

Match

The view from the top for Spartak Moscow

77 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.

Transfer targets

Too dear: Spartak Moscow walk away from Ronaldo

$9.6M was the most the club would pay and Rostov 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.

Market

Alesson asks to leave Spartak Moscow

“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 targets

Krasnodar tell Spartak Moscow: Moses Cobnan is not for sale

The approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.

Match

Spartak Moscow make it 4 in a row

Momentum is a hard thing to buy and an easy thing to lose, and right now Spartak Moscow have 4 straight wins of it.

Boardroom

Spartak Moscow close the window on a squad of their own making

4 in and 6 out, and no more changes for months. The manager has what he has, the supporters have their opinion of it, and the table will have the last word.

In brief

134 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

19 Feb 2029
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Squad

The knee: Andrey Kuzin out for 35 days

35 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Spartak Moscow lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.

The dugout

Alexander Djiku says Spartak Moscow went back on their word

“I was told what my role would be, and I signed on that basis. It has not happened.” A grievance with a date attached is the hardest kind to settle.

Transfer targets

Rubin tell Spartak Moscow: Yegor Golenkov is not for sale

The approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.

Market

Spartak Moscow sign Nikita Saltykov for $3.0M

The paperwork is done: Nikita Saltykov joins from Krylya Sovetov in a deal worth $3.0M. Now comes the harder part.

Squad

Nikita Saltykov gets the move he always wanted

Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Nikita Saltykov has just signed for Spartak Moscow, and for once the answer mattered.

Market

Spartak Moscow may not be able to give Pablo Solari what he wants

It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Pablo Solari wants continental football; whether Spartak Moscow can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.

Squad

Tempers go at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde 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.

Squad

Words at Spartak Moscow training over how hard people work

Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Pablo Solari 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.

Market

Victor Parada wants more than Spartak Moscow are offering

“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.

In brief

133 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

12 Feb 2029
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Transfer targets

The paperwork begins on Nikita Saltykov

A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Spartak Moscow have done the hard part with Krylya Sovetov, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.

Transfer targets

Rubin tell Spartak Moscow: Dardan Shabanhaxhaj is not for sale

The approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.

Transfer targets

Spartak Moscow make their move for Valentin Paltsev

$3.2M on the table at Krasnodar. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.

Transfer targets

Too dear: Spartak Moscow walk away from Valentin Paltsev

$2.0M was the most the club would pay and Krasnodar 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.

Market

Pedro wants more than Spartak Moscow are offering

“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.

Squad

Home is on Yves Bissouma's mind

“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; Spartak Moscow are dealing with a man who wants a different country.

Squad

Manfred Ugalde in a row with a teammate

It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Spartak Moscow this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.

Squad

A row about effort at Spartak Moscow

Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Marquinhos was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.

Loan watch

Makar Vysochenko has seen enough of Akhmat Grozny

“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 Spartak Moscow, and 7 appearances in 31 say he has earned the hearing.

In brief

132 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

5 Feb 2029
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Market

Pedro arrives at Spartak Moscow in a $30.8M statement of intent

There comes a point where a club either backs its own ambition or admits it does not have any. Spartak Moscow have paid $30.8M for Pedro, which is the loudest way there is of saying which one it chose.

Squad

Marquinhos takes the match ball home

4 goals in one afternoon from one man. The other players were also present, a witness confirmed.

Match

Spartak Moscow run riot against Akron

4‑0, and the margin flattered nobody — it could have carried another goal or two without complaint. Afternoons like this are why people keep coming.

Match

The season ends: position 1 for Spartak Moscow

The last league game has been played and the table has stopped moving: 77 points. The summer begins on Monday, and so does the argument about what it all meant.

Transfer targets

Too dear: Spartak Moscow walk away from Pavel Meleshin

$12.8M was the most the club would pay and Krylya Sovetov 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.

Market

Olakunle Olusegun is a Spartak Moscow player

The fee is $9.6M, the contract is signed, and the argument about whether he is worth it can begin. Rostov drove a hard bargain; time will say who won it.

Squad

Pedro gets the move he always wanted

Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Pedro has just signed for Spartak Moscow, and for once the answer mattered.

Market

Artem Bykovskiy agrees terms with Ufa

The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Spartak Moscow people have started saying his name in the past tense.

Transfer targets

Rostov tell Spartak Moscow: Olakunle Olusegun is not for sale

The approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.

In brief

131 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

29 Jan 2029
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Match

Spartak Moscow make home a hard place to visit

24 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.

Transfer targets

$30.8M settles it between the clubs for Pedro

Krasnodar have accepted the money. What Spartak Moscow do not yet have is the man, and between here and the photograph is a conversation about wages that both sides are dreading.

Match

Spartak Moscow are top

74 points and nobody above them. The word is not being said around the ground yet, and it is being thought in every seat.

Transfer targets

Door shut on Pedro

Spartak Moscow asked and Krasnodar said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.

Transfer targets

Spartak Moscow make their move for Olakunle Olusegun

$9.6M on the table at Rostov. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.

Transfer targets

Spartak Moscow make their move for Pavel Meleshin

$8.9M on the table at Krylya Sovetov. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.

Market

Alesson asks to leave Spartak Moscow

“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.

The dugout

Ilja Samoshnikov keeps the receipts

“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Spartak Moscow may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.

Squad

Manfred Ugalde is carrying Spartak Moscow

16 goals and a season average of 7.38. Form like that gets noticed well beyond this town.

In brief

130 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

22 Jan 2029
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Market

Ivan Lepskiy agrees terms with Saba

The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Spartak Moscow people have started saying his name in the past tense.

Squad

Spartak Moscow lose Pablo Solari

26 days, the medical staff say, and medical staff are optimists by profession. The team sheet will look wrong without him.

Squad

Pablo Solari is carrying Spartak Moscow

13 goals and a season average of 7.50. Form like that gets noticed well beyond this town.

Squad

Tempers go at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde 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.

Squad

A row about effort at Spartak Moscow

Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Marquinhos was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.

Market

Spartak Moscow may not be able to give Gustavo Santos what he wants

It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Gustavo Santos wants continental football; whether Spartak Moscow can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.

Match

Manfred Ugalde sends Spartak Moscow past Krylya Sovetov

It finished 1‑0, and it was Manfred Ugalde’s afternoon: on the scoresheet when it mattered, and the reason the points belong to Spartak Moscow.

The dugout

The manager makes an example of Igor Dmitriev

“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.

Player ratings

Nikita Iosifov was the difference for Spartak Moscow

Marked 7.92. Ask anyone leaving the ground what settled it and you will get one name, which is the only award that has ever really counted.

In brief

129 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

15 Jan 2029
From our football correspondent Steady

Match

The run is over for Spartak Moscow

32 matches without defeat, and then CSKA Moscow. Nobody at the ground pretended it would go on forever; nobody expected it to stop here either.

Match

Derby day misery for Spartak Moscow

Losing 0‑1 is one thing; losing to CSKA Moscow in a derby is a wound that takes months to close.

Market

Spartak Moscow turn down Ferencvaros for Yves Bissouma

The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.

Market

Marquinhos wants to know where this is going

“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 Spartak Moscow hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.

Market

Only the photograph left for Artem Bykovskiy

Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Artem Bykovskiy will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Spartak Moscow the goodbyes have quietly begun.

Squad

Manfred Ugalde in a row with a teammate

It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Spartak Moscow this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.

Squad

Hendrik Bonmann 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.

Market

Ivan Lepskiy attracts admirers

The name of Ivan Lepskiy has come up in conversations Spartak Moscow were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.

Player ratings

Marquinhos was unplayable

Successful dribbles: 18. 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.

In brief

128 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

8 Jan 2029
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Match

Still nobody has beaten Spartak Moscow

The unbeaten run reaches 32. Some of them were wins and some were escapes, but a side that refuses to lose is a side other dressing rooms talk about.

Match

The run at home goes on for Spartak Moscow

23 matches unbeaten here. Every visiting manager is asked about it in the week before, which is precisely why it keeps going.

Squad

The knee: Yves Bissouma out for 21 days

21 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Spartak Moscow lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.

Match

Nikita Iosifov sends Spartak Moscow through

Cup ties wait for somebody to seize them, and Nikita Iosifov obliged against Textilschik. 6‑0 on the night, and the name in the next round’s hat is Spartak Moscow.

Squad

3 goals for Nikita Iosifov

The match ball belongs to Nikita Iosifov, whose 3 goals turned a difficult afternoon into a procession.

Player ratings

Both of them Sebastián Arce's — 8.31

2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 8.31, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.

Squad

A falling-out at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.

Market

Spartak Moscow may not be able to give Igor Dmitriev what he wants

It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Igor Dmitriev wants continental football; whether Spartak Moscow can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.

Match

6 goals as Spartak Moscow and Textilschik go for it

Defending was optional and nobody took up the option. 6 goals between Spartak Moscow and Textilschik, and not one of the people who paid to be there will ask for the money back.

In brief

127 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

1 Jan 2029
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Match

Whatever happens, Spartak Moscow do not lose

30 games unbeaten now. Some were earned and some were survived, but a habit is forming — and habits are the hardest thing in football to play against.

Squad

The knee: Yves Bissouma out for 28 days

28 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Spartak Moscow lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.

Match

Spartak Moscow are top

67 points and nobody above them. The word is not being said around the ground yet, and it is being thought in every seat.

Match

After 16 games, Spartak Moscow finally taste it again

The first defeat in 16 matches. The manager will say it had to come; the dressing room will say it did not have to come against Zenit; the supporters will say both, in that order, all week.

Squad

Pablo Solari honoured for the season

The kind of year that ends with a name being read out in a hall. Spartak Moscow had the benefit of it every week and now have the problem of everybody else knowing.

The dugout

Artem Kasimov keeps the receipts

“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Spartak Moscow may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.

Market

Only the photograph left for Roman Zobnin

Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Roman Zobnin will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Spartak Moscow the goodbyes have quietly begun.

Squad

Words exchanged at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde 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.

Squad

Manfred Ugalde is carrying Spartak Moscow

14 goals and a season average of 7.36. Form like that gets noticed well beyond this town.

In brief

126 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

25 Dec 2028
From our football correspondent Triumph

Match

Spartak Moscow cannot stop winning

16 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.

Squad

Yves Bissouma damages knee ligaments — 35 days out

The words a physio says slowly. 35 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.

Match

Spartak Moscow make home a hard place to visit

21 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.

Match

Pablo Solari leads the rout of Dinamo Makhachkala

3‑0, and Pablo Solari took the headlines on an afternoon when everything Spartak Moscow tried came off. Days like this are retold all winter.

Squad

Pablo Solari out for 59 days

The medical room confirms 59 days on the sidelines for Pablo Solari, and a plan built around him now has to be rebuilt.

Squad

Defences have started doubling up on Pablo Solari

13 goals and a season average of 7.50 will do that. The space he used to find has gone; he keeps scoring anyway, which is the mark of the real thing.

Market

Marquinhos has his eye on Europe

It is not a grievance and it is not a demand: he wants to play continental football, and he has stopped hiding it. Whether Spartak Moscow can give him that is a question about the club, not about him.

Squad

Home is on Yuma Suzuki's mind

“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; Spartak Moscow are dealing with a man who wants a different country.

Player ratings

One of those days for Yuma Suzuki

There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.46, and no argument anywhere in the ground.

In brief

125 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

18 Dec 2028
From our football correspondent Triumph

Match

Spartak Moscow cannot stop winning

15 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.

Squad

The knee: Yves Bissouma out for 43 days

43 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Spartak Moscow lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.

Match

Another one collected away from home

10 on the bounce on the road for Spartak Moscow. The coaches leave early, arrive at unlovely grounds in the dark, and keep coming home with three points.

Player ratings

Nobody could get near Marquinhos

Successful dribbles: 33. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.

Player ratings

Up for the corner, and Christopher Martins Pereira delivers — 7.99

Centre-halves are allowed forward twice a season and are judged on what they do when they get there. Christopher Martins Pereira scored, was marked 7.99, and got back before anybody noticed he had gone.

Market

Pablo Solari has his eye on Europe

It is not a grievance and it is not a demand: he wants to play continental football, and he has stopped hiding it. Whether Spartak Moscow can give him that is a question about the club, not about him.

Market

Artem Bykovskiy is on his way

The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Spartak Moscow is pretending he will be back in the shirt.

Squad

Manfred Ugalde in a row with a teammate

It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Spartak Moscow this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.

Squad

Manfred Ugalde is in the form of his life

A season average of 7.34 with 13 goals behind it. Opponents have started planning around him, which is the sincerest compliment football pays.

In brief

124 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

11 Dec 2028
From our football correspondent Triumph

Match

Nobody wants to play Spartak Moscow right now

14 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.

Match

The run at home goes on for Spartak Moscow

20 matches unbeaten here. Every visiting manager is asked about it in the week before, which is precisely why it keeps going.

Match

Manfred Ugalde leads the rout of Sochi

4‑1, and Manfred Ugalde took the headlines on an afternoon when everything Spartak Moscow tried came off. Days like this are retold all winter.

Player ratings

Manfred Ugalde scores twice — 9.21

Two goals and a mark of 9.21 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.

Player ratings

Pablo Solari scores twice — 8.46

Two goals and a mark of 8.46 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.

Market

Yves Bissouma raises the bar for Spartak Moscow

“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Spartak Moscow heard it as anything else.

Squad

Yves Bissouma wants to go home

“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Spartak Moscow can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.

Squad

Pablo Solari is carrying Spartak Moscow

12 goals and a season average of 7.46. Form like that gets noticed well beyond this town.

Boardroom

Roman Zobnin has agreed to leave Spartak Moscow for nothing

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.

In brief

123 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

4 Dec 2028
From our football correspondent Triumph

Match

Spartak Moscow cannot stop winning

13 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.

Match

Spartak Moscow silence Dinamo Moscow

A derby is never about the football alone, but the football helped: 1‑0, and the away end emptied early. Bragging rights renewed for another season.

Match

The view from the top for Spartak Moscow

57 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.

Match

Another one collected away from home

9 on the bounce on the road for Spartak Moscow. The coaches leave early, arrive at unlovely grounds in the dark, and keep coming home with three points.

Market

Only the photograph left for Roman Zobnin

Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Roman Zobnin will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Spartak Moscow the goodbyes have quietly begun.

Market

Yuma Suzuki raises the bar for Spartak Moscow

“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Spartak Moscow heard it as anything else.

Player ratings

A derby belongs to Manfred Ugalde

Beat anybody else and it is three points. Beat them and it is a story a city tells for a decade. Spartak Moscow have their man.

Squad

Hendrik Bonmann signs a new deal

“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Hendrik Bonmann commits to Spartak Moscow for another 2 years.

Squad

Words exchanged at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde 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.

In brief

122 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

27 Nov 2028
From our football correspondent Triumph

Match

Derby delight as Spartak Moscow down Lokomotiv Moscow

Bragging rights belong to Spartak Moscow for another year after a 2‑0 win over Lokomotiv Moscow in front of a full house.

Match

Nobody wants to play Spartak Moscow right now

12 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.

Squad

A day Gustavo Santos will not forget

5 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.

Match

Nobody wins at Spartak Moscow

19 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.

Match

Gustavo Santos sends Spartak Moscow through

Cup ties wait for somebody to seize them, and Gustavo Santos obliged against Kuban. 8‑1 on the night, and the name in the next round’s hat is Spartak Moscow.

The dugout

Alexander Djiku keeps the receipts

“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Spartak Moscow may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.

Player ratings

Both of them Mikhail Ignatov's — 7.95

2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 7.95, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.

The terraces

Something is building at Spartak Moscow

Position 1 with 54 on the board, and the queues outside the ticket office are the part of a promotion push that never shows up in a table. The town has decided this one is real.

Player ratings

Age has not caught Roman Zobnin yet — 7.84

At 34 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 7.84 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.

In brief

121 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

20 Nov 2028
From our football correspondent Triumph

Match

Spartak Moscow cannot stop winning

10 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.

Match

The run at home goes on for Spartak Moscow

17 matches unbeaten here. Every visiting manager is asked about it in the week before, which is precisely why it keeps going.

Match

Spartak Moscow tear Fakel apart

Rarely has this fixture seen a display like it: 3‑0 against Fakel, and it could have been more.

The dugout

Ismael: 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.” Spartak Moscow have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.

Market

Artem Bykovskiy is on his way

The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Spartak Moscow is pretending he will be back in the shirt.

Squad

Manfred Ugalde in a row with a teammate

It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Spartak Moscow this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.

Market

Igor Dmitriev wants European nights

The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.

Squad

A row about effort at Spartak Moscow

Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Marquinhos was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.

Player ratings

Ninety minutes of Gedson Fernandes at his very best

Marked 8.21. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Spartak Moscow.

In brief

120 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

13 Nov 2028
From our football correspondent Triumph

Match

Spartak Moscow make it 9 in a row

Momentum is a hard thing to buy and an easy thing to lose, and right now Spartak Moscow have 9 straight wins of it.

Match

Spartak Moscow are at home on the road

8 straight away victories. Sides that win away are usually sides that can defend and can counter, and the table has begun to reflect what those journeys have earned.

Squad

A falling-out at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.

Market

Mirlind Daku raises the bar for Spartak Moscow

“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Spartak Moscow heard it as anything else.

Squad

Ruslan Litvinov out for 17 days

The medical room confirms 17 days on the sidelines for Ruslan Litvinov, and a plan built around him now has to be rebuilt.

Squad

A row about effort at Spartak Moscow

Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Pablo Solari was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.

Market

Spartak Moscow may not be able to give Gustavo Santos what he wants

It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Gustavo Santos wants continental football; whether Spartak Moscow can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.

Match

Spartak Moscow get the job done against Rostov

A 1‑0 win over Rostov, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.

Squad

Victor Parada reaches 200 appearances

200 games in the shirt. Nobody sets out to build a record like that; it happens to a certain kind of player at a certain kind of club, and this town knows what it has.

In brief

119 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

6 Nov 2028
From our football correspondent Triumph

Match

Spartak Moscow cannot stop winning

8 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.

Match

Spartak Moscow make home a hard place to visit

16 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.

Match

Spartak Moscow are top

45 points and nobody above them. The word is not being said around the ground yet, and it is being thought in every seat.

Player ratings

Both of them Manfred Ugalde's — 8.85

2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 8.85, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.

The dugout

Ivan Lepskiy keeps the receipts

“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Spartak Moscow may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.

Market

Pablo Solari wants to know where this is going

“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 Spartak Moscow hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.

Squad

Words exchanged at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde 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.

Player ratings

Pablo Solari runs at them all day

Successful dribbles: 21. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.

Squad

A row about effort at Spartak Moscow

Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Hendrik Bonmann was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.

In brief

118 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

30 Oct 2028
From our football correspondent Triumph

Match

Spartak Moscow tear Orenburg apart

Rarely has this fixture seen a display like it: 4‑1 against Orenburg, and it could have been more.

Match

Spartak Moscow cannot stop winning

7 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.

Player ratings

Manfred Ugalde scores twice — 9.29

Two goals and a mark of 9.29 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.

Match

Spartak Moscow are at home on the road

7 straight away victories. Sides that win away are usually sides that can defend and can counter, and the table has begun to reflect what those journeys have earned.

The dugout

Roman Zobnin says Spartak Moscow went back on their word

“I was told what my role would be, and I signed on that basis. It has not happened.” A grievance with a date attached is the hardest kind to settle.

Market

Spartak Moscow may not be able to give Marquinhos what he wants

It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Marquinhos wants continental football; whether Spartak Moscow can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.

Squad

Tempers go at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde 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.

Squad

Words at Spartak Moscow training over how hard people work

Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Marquinhos 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.

Squad

Pablo Solari is in the form of his life

A season average of 7.39 with 9 goals behind it. Opponents have started planning around him, which is the sincerest compliment football pays.

In brief

117 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

23 Oct 2028
From our football correspondent Triumph

Match

Nobody wins at Spartak Moscow

15 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.

Match

Nobody wants to play Spartak Moscow right now

6 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.

Market

Artem Bykovskiy has one foot out of the door

Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Spartak Moscow they have already started talking about him in the past tense.

Squad

Yuma Suzuki wants to go home

“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Spartak Moscow can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.

Squad

A row about effort at Spartak Moscow

Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Pablo Solari was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.

Match

Pablo Solari the difference as Spartak Moscow beat Akron

Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Pablo Solari. 2‑1 against Akron, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.

Squad

Defences have started doubling up on Pablo Solari

8 goals and a season average of 7.35 will do that. The space he used to find has gone; he keeps scoring anyway, which is the mark of the real thing.

Player ratings

Pablo Solari in the eights

A performance of 8.33 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.

Player ratings

One of those days for Marquinhos

There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.21, and no argument anywhere in the ground.

In brief

116 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

16 Oct 2028
From our football correspondent Triumph

Match

Nobody wants to play Spartak Moscow right now

5 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.

The dugout

Artem Kasimov: 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.” Spartak Moscow have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.

Match

Spartak Moscow keep winning on the road

6 away wins in a row. Travelling support is the truest kind, and this season it is being repaid in the only currency that counts.

Market

Pablo Solari wants European nights

The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.

Squad

A falling-out at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.

The dugout

No hiding place for Manfred Ugalde

“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Manfred Ugalde, and the manager let it.

Match

Spartak Moscow see off Nizhniy Novgorod

Three points for Spartak Moscow, 2‑0 the final word against Nizhniy Novgorod in a contest settled by the finer margins.

Squad

A row about effort at Spartak Moscow

Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Christopher Wooh was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.

Player ratings

A masterclass from Pablo Solari

Marked 8.41 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.

In brief

115 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

9 Oct 2028
From our football correspondent Triumph

Squad

A day Nikita Iosifov will not forget

6 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.

Squad

A day Sebastián Arce will not forget

4 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.

Match

Spartak Moscow through in the cup

A 12‑0 win over Spartak Nalchik, and the draw for the next round can be watched with some interest for once.

Match

No mercy from Spartak Moscow

Krylya Sovetov will want this one forgotten quickly: 6‑0, every duel lost, and a long ride home. Spartak Moscow were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.

Match

The view from the top for Spartak Moscow

33 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.

Squad

3 goals for Mirlind Daku

The match ball belongs to Mirlind Daku, whose 3 goals turned a difficult afternoon into a procession.

Match

The run at home goes on for Spartak Moscow

14 matches unbeaten here. Every visiting manager is asked about it in the week before, which is precisely why it keeps going.

Match

Spartak Moscow cannot stop winning

4 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.

Market

Marquinhos wants to know where this is going

“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 Spartak Moscow hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.

In brief

114 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

2 Oct 2028
From our football correspondent Triumph

Match

Pablo Solari wins the derby for Spartak Moscow

Derby days make names, and Pablo Solari made his against CSKA Moscow. 2‑0, bragging rights secured, and one half of town will be tired of hearing about him by Tuesday.

Match

Whatever happens, Spartak Moscow do not lose

15 games unbeaten now. Some were earned and some were survived, but a habit is forming — and habits are the hardest thing in football to play against.

Match

The run at home goes on for Spartak Moscow

12 matches unbeaten here. Every visiting manager is asked about it in the week before, which is precisely why it keeps going.

Player ratings

Pablo Solari wins the derby

There are goals, and then there are goals against that particular opponent. The Spartak Moscow support have their bragging rights for a year and they know exactly whose name is on them.

Squad

Tempers go at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde 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.

Squad

Pablo Solari 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.

Squad

Mamadou Maïga signs a new deal

“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Mamadou Maïga commits to Spartak Moscow for another 2 years.

The dugout

Alesson gets it from the manager

“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.

The dugout

Pablo Solari has become a man the manager trusts

Nobody at Spartak Moscow 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.

In brief

113 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

25 Sep 2028
From our football correspondent Triumph

Match

Still nobody has beaten Spartak Moscow

The unbeaten run reaches 14. Some of them were wins and some were escapes, but a side that refuses to lose is a side other dressing rooms talk about.

Player ratings

A brace, and Mirlind Daku takes the afternoon — 9.00

There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Mirlind Daku provided it, and the 9.00 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.

Market

Artem Bykovskiy is on his way

The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Spartak Moscow is pretending he will be back in the shirt.

Match

Spartak Moscow are at home on the road

5 straight away victories. Sides that win away are usually sides that can defend and can counter, and the table has begun to reflect what those journeys have earned.

Squad

Manfred Ugalde in a row with a teammate

It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Spartak Moscow this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.

Squad

A row about effort at Spartak Moscow

Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Hendrik Bonmann was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.

Match

Spartak Moscow see off Rubin

Three points for Spartak Moscow, 3‑1 the final word against Rubin in a contest settled by the finer margins.

Player ratings

One of those days for Pablo Solari

There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.20, and no argument anywhere in the ground.

Squad

Spartak Moscow lose Aleksey Maltsev

15 days, the medical staff say, and medical staff are optimists by profession. The team sheet will look wrong without him.

In brief

112 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

18 Sep 2028
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Match

13 unbeaten for Spartak Moscow

Hard to beat is not the same as winning, but 13 matches without defeat is a foundation Spartak Moscow did not have in the autumn.

Match

Spartak Moscow are in among the leaders

Position 2 and 24 points on the board. Nobody at the ground will say the word out loud yet, and everybody at the ground is thinking it.

Match

Spartak Moscow make home a hard place to visit

11 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.

Squad

A falling-out at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.

Squad

A row about effort at Spartak Moscow

Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Marquinhos was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.

Match

After 6 games, Spartak Moscow finally taste it again

The first defeat in 6 matches. The manager will say it had to come; the dressing room will say it did not have to come against Zenit; the supporters will say both, in that order, all week.

Player ratings

Marquinhos beats them one at a time

Successful dribbles: 18. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.

Player ratings

One of those days for Pablo Solari

There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.13, and no argument anywhere in the ground.

Market

Amir Saipi raises the bar for Spartak Moscow

“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Spartak Moscow heard it as anything else.

In brief

111 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

11 Sep 2028
From our football correspondent Triumph

Match

Spartak Moscow tear Dinamo Makhachkala apart

Rarely has this fixture seen a display like it: 3‑0 against Dinamo Makhachkala, and it could have been more.

Player ratings

Both of them Marquinhos's — 8.36

2 goals, and the second was the one that settled it. Marked 8.36, and he could have had a third with better luck at the near post.

Transfer targets

Olakunle Olusegun stays at Rostov as time runs out

A deal that was a phone call from completion at lunchtime was dead by midnight. Spartak Moscow will try again when the window opens; Rostov may not be selling by then.

Market

Terms done: Artem Bykovskiy is going

Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Ufa waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Spartak Moscow is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.

Match

Spartak Moscow are top

23 points and nobody above them. The word is not being said around the ground yet, and it is being thought in every seat.

Match

Spartak Moscow make it 6 in a row

Momentum is a hard thing to buy and an easy thing to lose, and right now Spartak Moscow have 6 straight wins of it.

Boardroom

Window shuts: 15 in, 19 out at Spartak Moscow

The deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 15 arrived, 19 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed one.

Market

Yuma Suzuki wants to know where this is going

“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 Spartak Moscow hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.

Squad

Tempers go at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde 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.

In brief

110 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

4 Sep 2028
From our football correspondent Triumph

Transfer targets

Spartak Moscow make their move for Olakunle Olusegun

$20.6M on the table at Rostov. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.

Market

Fabio Lima says no to Ufa

“I listened, I thought about it, and I am staying. That is the whole story.” The clubs had agreed a fee. Fabio Lima had not agreed to go, which turned out to be the part that mattered.

Match

Spartak Moscow cannot stop winning

5 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.

Player ratings

Christopher Martins Pereira goes up and wins it — 7.76

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 7.76 for the rest of it.

Market

Yves Bissouma wants to know where this is going

“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 Spartak Moscow hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.

Squad

Tempers go at Spartak Moscow

Pablo Solari 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.

Match

Spartak Moscow make home a hard place to visit

10 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.

Market

Igor Dmitriev wants European nights

The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.

Squad

Alexander Djiku signs on for more

“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Alexander Djiku and Spartak Moscow agree another 2 years.

In brief

109 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

28 Aug 2028
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Match

Spartak Moscow run riot against Sochi

3‑0, and the margin flattered nobody — it could have carried another goal or two without complaint. Afternoons like this are why people keep coming.

Market

Artem Bykovskiy has said yes to Breidablik

The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Spartak Moscow have lost him in all but the paperwork.

Market

Roman Zobnin 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 Spartak Moscow can pretend not to have heard.

Match

Nobody wants to play Spartak Moscow right now

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.

Player ratings

Up for the corner, and Yves Bissouma delivers — 7.98

Centre-halves are allowed forward twice a season and are judged on what they do when they get there. Yves Bissouma scored, was marked 7.98, and got back before anybody noticed he had gone.

Squad

A falling-out at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.

Market

Spartak Moscow may not be able to give Mirlind Daku what he wants

It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Mirlind Daku wants continental football; whether Spartak Moscow can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.

Squad

A row about effort at Spartak Moscow

Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Marquinhos was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.

Match

Spartak Moscow keep winning on the road

3 away wins in a row. Travelling support is the truest kind, and this season it is being repaid in the only currency that counts.

In brief

108 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

21 Aug 2028
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Match

Spartak Moscow silence Dinamo Moscow

A derby is never about the football alone, but the football helped: 2‑1, and the away end emptied early. Bragging rights renewed for another season.

Market

Marquinhos wants more than Spartak Moscow are offering

“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.

Market

Spartak Moscow may not be able to give Pablo Solari what he wants

It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Pablo Solari wants continental football; whether Spartak Moscow can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.

Player ratings

A derby belongs to Marquinhos

Beat anybody else and it is three points. Beat them and it is a story a city tells for a decade. Spartak Moscow have their man.

Match

Nobody wants to play Spartak Moscow right now

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.

Squad

Yuma Suzuki wants to go home

“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Spartak Moscow can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.

Squad

Manfred Ugalde in a row with a teammate

It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Spartak Moscow this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.

Player ratings

Pablo Solari was unplayable

Successful dribbles: 22. 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.

Squad

Words at Spartak Moscow training over how hard people work

Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Pablo Solari 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.

In brief

107 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

14 Aug 2028
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Match

Mirlind Daku wins the derby for Spartak Moscow

Derby days make names, and Mirlind Daku made his against Lokomotiv Moscow. 3‑1, bragging rights secured, and one half of town will be tired of hearing about him by Tuesday.

Market

Fabio Lima has said yes to Ufa

The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Spartak Moscow have lost him in all but the paperwork.

Player ratings

Mirlind Daku settles the derby

Beat anybody else and it is three points. Beat them, with his name on it, and it is a year of bragging rights for Spartak Moscow and a story that will outlast his contract.

Transfer targets

Spartak Moscow rebuffed over Dardan Shabanhaxhaj

Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Rubin have kept their man, and Spartak Moscow go back to a list with one name crossed off it.

Squad

Ismael 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. Ismael has, at Spartak Moscow, and the first month will show what that does to a man.

Match

Still nobody has beaten Spartak Moscow

The unbeaten run reaches 8. Some of them were wins and some were escapes, but a side that refuses to lose is a side other dressing rooms talk about.

Squad

Tempers go at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde 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.

Squad

Late improvement for Gedson Fernandes

At 29 the improving is meant to be over, and it is not: 3 points better than a year ago. It happens to the ones who take the boring parts seriously.

Squad

Hendrik Bonmann 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.

In brief

106 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

7 Aug 2028
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Match

Christopher Martins Pereira leads the rout of Fakel

3‑0, and Christopher Martins Pereira took the headlines on an afternoon when everything Spartak Moscow tried came off. Days like this are retold all winter.

Player ratings

Pablo Solari beats them one at a time

Successful dribbles: 31. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.

Squad

Nail Umyarov: 10 seasons and counting

252 appearances across 10 seasons in one shirt. Careers like that are not built on purpose any more, and Spartak Moscow know exactly what they have.

Player ratings

Christopher Martins Pereira goes up and wins it — 7.96

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 7.96 for the rest of it.

Squad

Mamadou Maïga gets the move he always wanted

Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Mamadou Maïga has just signed for Spartak Moscow, and for once the answer mattered.

Market

Pablo Solari wants more than Spartak Moscow are offering

“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.

Squad

Words exchanged at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde 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.

Match

Whatever happens, Spartak Moscow do not lose

7 games unbeaten now. Some were earned and some were survived, but a habit is forming — and habits are the hardest thing in football to play against.

Squad

Marquinhos 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.

In brief

105 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

31 Jul 2028
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Market

Pablo Solari comes home

The shirt still fits. Pablo Solari is back at Spartak Moscow, and half the ground remembers him in these colours already. Some signings need selling to the town; this one sold itself.

Market

Alesson puts it in writing

“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Spartak Moscow, and it is not being withdrawn.

Market

Not going: Fabio Lima stays at Spartak Moscow

“I know what people will say. I know what I want, and it is here.” Ufa had the fee agreed and the shirt ready; they did not have the player, and now they will not.

The dugout

Alesson keeps the receipts

“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Spartak Moscow may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.

Market

Artem Bykovskiy agrees terms with Breidablik

The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Spartak Moscow people have started saying his name in the past tense.

Squad

Pablo Solari gets the move he always wanted

Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Pablo Solari has just signed for Spartak Moscow, and for once the answer mattered.

Transfer targets

Door shut on Dominik Oroz

Spartak Moscow asked and Krylya Sovetov said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.

Squad

A falling-out at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.

Squad

A row about effort at Spartak Moscow

Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Marquinhos was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.

In brief

104 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

24 Jul 2028
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Transfer targets

Pablo Solari is a medical away from Spartak Moscow

The deal with Rostov 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.

Market

Terms done: Ivan Lepskiy is going

Fee agreed, wages agreed, and MFK Skalica waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Spartak Moscow is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.

Player ratings

Nobody could get near Marquinhos

Successful dribbles: 30. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.

Transfer targets

Spartak Moscow rebuffed over Alexey Mironov

Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Rostov have kept their man, and Spartak Moscow go back to a list with one name crossed off it.

Market

Spartak Moscow say no — this time

The offer from Ural for Fabio Lima 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.

Squad

Manfred Ugalde in a row with a teammate

It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Spartak Moscow this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.

Squad

Words at Spartak Moscow training over how hard people work

Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Hendrik Bonmann 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.

Squad

A late step up for Nail Umyarov

At 28 the improving is meant to be over. It is not: 3 points better than the mark taken at the start of the year, which is the sort of thing that happens to players who take the boring parts of the job seriously.

Squad

Nail Umyarov reaches 200 appearances

200 games in the shirt. Nobody sets out to build a record like that; it happens to a certain kind of player at a certain kind of club, and this town knows what it has.

In brief

103 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

17 Jul 2028
From our football correspondent Triumph

Match

No mercy from Spartak Moscow

Orenburg will want this one forgotten quickly: 3‑0, every duel lost, and a long ride home. Spartak Moscow were ruthless in the way good sides are ruthless.

Market

Not going: Igor Dmitriev stays at Spartak Moscow

“I know what people will say. I know what I want, and it is here.” Krasnodar had the fee agreed and the shirt ready; they did not have the player, and now they will not.

Transfer targets

An offer of $13.7M for Pablo Solari

Spartak Moscow have gone to Rostov with a bid, and the supporters have gone to the internet with an opinion about it. Whether either changes anything is up to the selling club.

Player ratings

A brace, and Marquinhos takes the afternoon — 8.05

There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Marquinhos provided it, and the 8.05 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.

Transfer targets

Krasnodar tell Spartak Moscow: Moses Cobnan is not for sale

The approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.

Match

Spartak Moscow cannot stop winning

4 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.

Market

Nikita Iosifov is a Spartak Moscow player

The fee is $1.7M, the contract is signed, and the argument about whether he is worth it can begin. Krylya Sovetov drove a hard bargain; time will say who won it.

Squad

Nikita Iosifov 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. Nikita Iosifov has, at Spartak Moscow, and the first month will show what that does to a man.

Market

Slavia Mozyr come back empty-handed

The bid was some way short and Spartak Moscow did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.

In brief

102 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

10 Jul 2028
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Transfer targets

Spartak Moscow rebuffed over Nikita Krivtsov

Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Krasnodar have kept their man, and Spartak Moscow go back to a list with one name crossed off it.

Market

Spartak Moscow sign Vladislav Sarveli for $7.1M

The paperwork is done: Vladislav Sarveli joins from Nizhniy Novgorod in a deal worth $7.1M. Now comes the harder part.

Squad

A move Vladislav Sarveli would have made for nothing

There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Vladislav Sarveli is living that version at Spartak Moscow, and it tends to show in the first month.

Squad

Words exchanged at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde 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.

Market

Spartak Moscow may not be able to give Igor Dmitriev what he wants

It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Igor Dmitriev wants continental football; whether Spartak Moscow can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.

Squad

Words at Spartak Moscow training over how hard people work

Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Marquinhos 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.

Market

The Igor Dmitriev conversation is coming

Everyone has stopped pretending: Krasnodar will make the call about Igor Dmitriev this week. Spartak Moscow have a number in mind, and the number is not shy.

The dugout

The manager makes an example of Igor Dmitriev

“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.

Squad

Spartak Moscow are still strangers to each other

5 new signings in one window. Every one may be an upgrade and the side can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild the verdicts never mention.

In brief

101 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

3 Jul 2028
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Squad

Ilja Samoshnikov damages knee ligaments — 18 days out

The words a physio says slowly. 18 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.

Transfer targets

$7.1M settles it between the clubs for Vladislav Sarveli

Nizhniy Novgorod have accepted the money. What Spartak Moscow do not yet have is the man, and between here and the photograph is a conversation about wages that both sides are dreading.

Market

Terms done: German Onugkha is going

Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Alanyaspor waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Spartak Moscow is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.

Market

Not going: Fabio Lima stays at Spartak Moscow

“I know what people will say. I know what I want, and it is here.” Fakel had the fee agreed and the shirt ready; they did not have the player, and now they will not.

Transfer targets

Akhmat Grozny tell Spartak Moscow: Mohamed Konaté is not for sale

The approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.

Market

Marquinhos wants to know where this is going

“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 Spartak Moscow hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.

Squad

A falling-out at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.

Transfer targets

No deal for Lucas Olaza at that price

Spartak Moscow offered $710.0K; Krasnodar 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.

Market

Spartak Moscow may not be able to give Mirlind Daku what he wants

It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Mirlind Daku wants continental football; whether Spartak Moscow can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.

In brief

100 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

26 Jun 2028
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Squad

The knee: Ilja Samoshnikov out for 26 days

26 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Spartak Moscow lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.

Market

Spartak Moscow sign Gustavo Santos for $13.0M

The paperwork is done: Gustavo Santos joins from Krasnodar in a deal worth $13.0M. Now comes the harder part.

Transfer targets

Too dear: Spartak Moscow walk away from Maksim Samorodov

$13.5M was the most the club would pay and Akhmat Grozny 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.

Market

Business is business: Daniil Denisov goes

Krasnodar paid $7.1M and Spartak Moscow took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.

Market

Spartak Moscow get their man

The chase for Gilson Benchimol ended with $3.5M changing hands and Nizhniy Novgorod out of reasons to say no. The supporters will judge the fee the only way that matters: on Saturdays.

Market

Spartak Moscow say no — this time

The offer from Ural for Fabio Lima 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.

Squad

Gustavo Santos 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. Gustavo Santos has, at Spartak Moscow, and the first month will show what that does to a man.

Transfer targets

Spartak Moscow rebuffed over Daniil Lesovoy

Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Nizhniy Novgorod have kept their man, and Spartak Moscow go back to a list with one name crossed off it.

Squad

Home is on Yves Bissouma's mind

“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; Spartak Moscow are dealing with a man who wants a different country.

In brief

99 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

19 Jun 2028
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Squad

Ilja Samoshnikov damages knee ligaments — 33 days out

The words a physio says slowly. 33 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.

Match

Nobody above Spartak Moscow

First, on 76 points. The table is a fact and a fact is allowed to be enjoyed, which is as far as anybody at the club is prepared to go in public.

Transfer targets

Spartak Moscow bid $13.0M for Gustavo Santos

The offer went to Krasnodar this week and it is theirs to answer. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loud the door closes.

Transfer targets

Fee done, terms next for Gilson Benchimol

Spartak Moscow and Nizhniy Novgorod have settled on $3.5M. The rest belongs to the player and his agent, and a supporter who has watched one of these before knows not to buy the shirt yet.

Transfer targets

Spartak Moscow make their move for Maksim Samorodov

$11.7M on the table at Akhmat Grozny. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.

Transfer targets

Krasnodar tell Spartak Moscow: Gustavo Santos is not for sale

The approach was made and the answer came back in a sentence. There is no number on the table because there was no number that would have been enough.

Market

Marquinhos has his eye on Europe

It is not a grievance and it is not a demand: he wants to play continental football, and he has stopped hiding it. Whether Spartak Moscow can give him that is a question about the club, not about him.

Squad

Yuma Suzuki wants to go home

“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 Spartak Moscow know it.

Squad

Tempers go at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde 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.

In brief

98 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

12 Jun 2028
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Market

Not going: German Onugkha stays at Spartak Moscow

“I know what people will say. I know what I want, and it is here.” Belgrano had the fee agreed and the shirt ready; they did not have the player, and now they will not.

Market

Slovan Bratislava come back empty-handed

The bid was some way short and Spartak Moscow did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.

Market

Yuma Suzuki wants more than Spartak Moscow are offering

“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.

Squad

Marquinhos stays put

“The easiest signature of my career.” Marquinhos and Spartak Moscow agree another 4 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.

Squad

Words exchanged at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde 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.

Squad

A row about effort at Spartak Moscow

Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Hendrik Bonmann was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.

Squad

A quiet fortnight at Spartak Moscow

With 5 players away on international duty the sessions are small and the manager can actually hear himself. It is the one break in the season, and it never quite feels like one.

The dugout

When it matters, Yves Bissouma plays

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.

The dugout

The manager makes Mirlind Daku a promise

Nothing in writing and nothing in public: a word about playing time, given face to face at Spartak Moscow. The team sheets over the next month will show whether it was worth having.

In brief

97 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

5 Jun 2028
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Boardroom

Silverware for Spartak Moscow

They will talk about this season in this town for a long time. The trophy comes home with the squad, and the route is already agreed.

Market

Slovan Bratislava come back empty-handed

The bid was some way short and Spartak Moscow did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.

Squad

The season belongs to Marquinhos

An individual honour is a strange thing in a team game, and the best of them are never argued with. He has had the sort of year that ends with his name being read out, and Spartak Moscow have had the benefit of it.

Market

Slovan Bratislava watching Gedson Fernandes

The interest is real enough to have reached print. Spartak Moscow have said nothing, which in a transfer window is its own kind of answer.

Market

Yves Bissouma raises the bar for Spartak Moscow

“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Spartak Moscow heard it as anything else.

Boardroom

Vadim Tsygankov signs for Dinamo Vologda while still at Spartak Moscow

The rules permit it and it stings anyway. Vadim Tsygankov has agreed terms with Dinamo Vologda for the summer, and until then he pulls on this shirt as a player who has already chosen his next one.

Squad

A falling-out at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.

Squad

The golden glove goes to Hendrik Bonmann

21 clean sheets across a season, and the one award on the pitch nobody else is eligible for. Most keepers get through a whole career without a year like it.

Squad

Words at Spartak Moscow training over how hard people work

Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Christopher Wooh 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.

In brief

96 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

29 May 2028
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Squad

Marquinhos in a row with a teammate

It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Spartak Moscow this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.

Squad

Hendrik Bonmann 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.

The dugout

When it matters, Yuma Suzuki plays

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.

Market

Manfred Ugalde linked with a move away

The name of Manfred Ugalde keeps appearing in other people's back pages. Spartak Moscow say nothing, which says plenty.

The dugout

Ruslan Litvinov knocks on the manager's door

“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Spartak Moscow, and both men came out saying it was fine.

The dugout

The manager makes Nail Umyarov a promise

Nothing in writing and nothing in public: a word about playing time, given face to face at Spartak Moscow. The team sheets over the next month will show whether it was worth having.

In brief

95 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

22 May 2028
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Match

Nobody above Spartak Moscow

First, on 76 points. The table is a fact and a fact is allowed to be enjoyed, which is as far as anybody at the club is prepared to go in public.

Squad

Tempers go at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde 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.

Squad

Words at Spartak Moscow training over how hard people work

Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Hendrik Bonmann 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 dugout

When it matters, Marquinhos plays

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.

The dugout

Ruslan Litvinov 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.

The dugout

A door opens for Mirlind Daku

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.

Market

The Nail Umyarov question follows Spartak Moscow around

Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Nail Umyarov’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.

Squad

Mirlind Daku wants to know why he earns less

Numbers do not stay secret in a dressing room. He is not asking for more than he is worth; he is asking why somebody beside him is worth more, and Spartak Moscow have no good answer.

The dugout

Marquinhos keeps his manager's vote

The message was aimed at the stands as much as the dressing room: Marquinhos plays, and the argument is closed until the manager decides otherwise.

In brief

94 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

15 May 2028
From our football correspondent Upbeat

The dugout

Igor Dmitriev: 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.” Spartak Moscow have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.

Market

Daniil Denisov asks to leave Spartak Moscow

“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.

Market

Marquinhos wants to know where this is going

“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 Spartak Moscow hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.

Squad

Manfred Ugalde signs a new deal

“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Manfred Ugalde commits to Spartak Moscow for another 5 years.

Squad

Words exchanged at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde 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.

Squad

Words at Spartak Moscow training over how hard people work

Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Marquinhos 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 dugout

When it matters, Yves Bissouma plays

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.

The dugout

Alexander Djiku 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.

Market

The Gedson Fernandes talk will not go away

Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Spartak Moscow know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.

In brief

93 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

8 May 2028
From our football correspondent Upbeat

The dugout

Artem Kasimov keeps the receipts

“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Spartak Moscow may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.

Squad

Hendrik Bonmann stays put

“The easiest signature of my career.” Hendrik Bonmann and Spartak Moscow agree another 2 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.

Squad

A falling-out at Spartak Moscow

Yves Bissouma and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.

Squad

Words at Spartak Moscow training over how hard people work

Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Marquinhos 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.

Market

Still no ink between Spartak Moscow and Alexander Djiku

“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Spartak Moscow, another week without a signature from Alexander Djiku.

The dugout

When it matters, Manfred Ugalde plays

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.

The dugout

Alexander Djiku 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 Alexander Djiku trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.

Loan watch

Sebastiano Nava’s loan is measured in nothing happening

9 clean sheets from 25 appearances at Shinnik. That is the whole of a goalkeeper’s job done properly, and it is being done a long way from the club that owns him.

Loan watch

The goals keep arriving from Daniil Zorin’s exile

7 goals in 33 games at Neftekhimik — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Spartak Moscow updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.

In brief

92 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

1 May 2028
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Squad

Manfred Ugalde in a row with a teammate

It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Spartak Moscow this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.

Market

Mirlind Daku raises the bar for Spartak Moscow

“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Spartak Moscow heard it as anything else.

Squad

A row about effort at Spartak Moscow

Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Hendrik Bonmann was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.

Squad

Leo Goglichidze slips down the pecking order

The demotion a club never announces and a dressing room always notices. Leo Goglichidze is further from the side than he was, and the reason will not be given until he asks.

The dugout

Yuma Suzuki has become a man the manager trusts

Nobody at Spartak Moscow 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.

The dugout

The manager makes an example of Artem Kasimov

“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.

Market

Manfred Ugalde linked with a move away

The name of Manfred Ugalde keeps appearing in other people's back pages. Spartak Moscow say nothing, which says plenty.

Squad

Hendrik Bonmann remains an outsider

A year in and the city has not opened up, the language has not come, and lunch is eaten alone more often than anybody at Spartak Moscow would admit. It shows on Saturdays.

Loan watch

Daniil Zorin would sign for Neftekhimik tomorrow

“Nobody here treats me like a loan player, and that is worth more than people think.” 33 appearances and 7 goals, and a summer that will decide it.

In brief

91 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

24 Apr 2028
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Match

Nobody above Spartak Moscow

First, on 76 points. The table is a fact and a fact is allowed to be enjoyed, which is as far as anybody at the club is prepared to go in public.

Squad

Yves Bissouma wants to go home

“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 Spartak Moscow know it.

Squad

Tempers go at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde 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.

Market

Spartak Moscow may not be able to give Mirlind Daku what he wants

It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Mirlind Daku wants continental football; whether Spartak Moscow can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.

Squad

Words at Spartak Moscow training over how hard people work

Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Marquinhos 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.

Market

Amir Saipi wants to know where this is going

“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 Spartak Moscow hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.

The dugout

When it matters, Marquinhos plays

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.

Market

The Nail Umyarov question follows Spartak Moscow around

Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Nail Umyarov’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.

The dugout

A door opens for Anton Zinkovskiy

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.

In brief

90 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

17 Apr 2028
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Market

Spartak Moscow may not be able to give Marquinhos what he wants

It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Marquinhos wants continental football; whether Spartak Moscow can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.

Squad

Yuma Suzuki wants to go home

“I have tried. I have really tried, and every day I wake up in the wrong place.” Nobody at Spartak Moscow can coach that out of a man, and nobody there is pretending to.

Squad

Words exchanged at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde 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.

Squad

Words at Spartak Moscow training over how hard people work

Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Marquinhos 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 dugout

No hiding place for Leo Goglichidze

“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Leo Goglichidze, and the manager let it.

The dugout

Yves Bissouma gets picked when it counts

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 Yves Bissouma is on it.

Market

The Gedson Fernandes talk will not go away

Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Spartak Moscow know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.

Loan watch

6 goals on loan for German Onugkha

17 appearances at NK Osijek and the goals keep coming. Spartak Moscow are watching this more closely than the borrowing club would like.

The dugout

A door opens for Nail Umyarov

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.

In brief

89 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

10 Apr 2028
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Squad

A falling-out at Spartak Moscow

Marquinhos and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.

Squad

Words at Spartak Moscow training over how hard people work

Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Hendrik Bonmann 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.

Squad

Spartak Moscow lose Fabio Lima

34 days, the medical staff say, and medical staff are optimists by profession. The team sheet will look wrong without him.

The dugout

Mirlind Daku gets it from the manager

“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.

The dugout

Manfred Ugalde gets picked when it counts

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 Manfred Ugalde is on it.

Loan watch

Sebastiano Nava’s loan is measured in nothing happening

9 clean sheets from 25 appearances at Shinnik. That is the whole of a goalkeeper’s job done properly, and it is being done a long way from the club that owns him.

Loan watch

Daniil Zorin keeps scoring at Neftekhimik

33 appearances away from home and 7 goals to show for them. Every one of them makes next summer's conversation a little more expensive.

The dugout

Ruslan Litvinov 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.

Market

The Mirlind Daku story refuses to die

It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Mirlind Daku signs something — a contract at Spartak Moscow or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.

In brief

88 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

3 Apr 2028
From our football correspondent Upbeat

The dugout

Ruslan Litvinov says Spartak Moscow went back on their word

“I was told what my role would be, and I signed on that basis. It has not happened.” A grievance with a date attached is the hardest kind to settle.

Squad

Manfred Ugalde in a row with a teammate

It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Spartak Moscow this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.

Squad

Marquinhos 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.

Squad

Home is on Alesson's mind

“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; Spartak Moscow are dealing with a man who wants a different country.

The dugout

When it matters, Yuma Suzuki plays

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.

Market

Ilja Svinov returns from a loan that taught him nothing

3 appearances and 2 clean sheets. A goalkeeper learns his job by playing it, and a season that gave him neither the games nor the shut-outs is a year taken off the front of a career.

Market

Manfred Ugalde linked with a move away

The name of Manfred Ugalde keeps appearing in other people's back pages. Spartak Moscow say nothing, which says plenty.

Market

Spartak Moscow and Daniil Denisov are talking past each other

“There is a gap, and pretending there is not helps nobody.” Neither side has moved, and the calendar is working for exactly one of them.

The dugout

Mikhail Ignatov 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.

In brief

87 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

27 Mar 2028
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Match

The view from the top for Spartak Moscow

76 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.

Market

Marquinhos wants more than Spartak Moscow are offering

“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.

Squad

Tempers go at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde 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.

Squad

Marquinhos 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.

The dugout

Nail Umyarov gets it from the manager

“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.

The dugout

Marquinhos has become a man the manager trusts

Nobody at Spartak Moscow 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.

The dugout

Alexander Djiku 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 Alexander Djiku trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.

Market

The Nail Umyarov question follows Spartak Moscow around

Every press conference now starts and ends the same way: with Nail Umyarov’s future. The manager has run out of new ways to say nothing.

The dugout

Anton Zinkovskiy has been promised minutes

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 Anton Zinkovskiy has written the date down.

In brief

86 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

20 Mar 2028
From our football correspondent Upbeat

The dugout

Alexander Djiku: 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.” Spartak Moscow have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.

Market

Yuma Suzuki wants European nights

The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.

Squad

Words exchanged at Spartak Moscow

Yves Bissouma 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.

Squad

Words at Spartak Moscow training over how hard people work

Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Hendrik Bonmann 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.

Market

Amir Saipi wants to know where this is going

“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 Spartak Moscow hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.

Squad

International break empties Spartak Moscow

4 call-ups is a compliment to the squad and a headache for the man running it. He will get them back in a fortnight, tired, in various states of repair.

The dugout

Yves Bissouma gets picked when it counts

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 Yves Bissouma is on it.

Market

The Gedson Fernandes talk will not go away

Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Spartak Moscow know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.

The dugout

Igor Dmitriev 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.

In brief

85 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

13 Mar 2028
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Market

Yuma Suzuki wants more than Spartak Moscow are offering

“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.

Squad

A falling-out at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.

Squad

Words at Spartak Moscow training over how hard people work

Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Marquinhos 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 dugout

Manfred Ugalde has become a man the manager trusts

Nobody at Spartak Moscow 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.

Loan watch

Nobody is scoring past Sebastiano Nava at Shinnik

9 shut-outs in 25 games. A goalkeeper’s loan is judged on the afternoons when nothing happened at all, and Sebastiano Nava has been having a lot of them.

Loan watch

The goals keep arriving from Daniil Zorin’s exile

7 goals in 33 games at Neftekhimik — numbers that travel home faster than he does. Somebody at Spartak Moscow updates a spreadsheet every Monday, and it makes better reading each week.

Squad

A season on the outside for Alesson

He trains hard, says the right things and goes home to an empty flat. Nobody at Spartak Moscow has done anything wrong, which is exactly what makes it so difficult to fix.

Market

The Mirlind Daku story refuses to die

It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Mirlind Daku signs something — a contract at Spartak Moscow or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.

The dugout

The manager makes Anton Zinkovskiy a promise

Nothing in writing and nothing in public: a word about playing time, given face to face at Spartak Moscow. The team sheets over the next month will show whether it was worth having.

In brief

84 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

6 Mar 2028
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Market

Spartak Moscow say no — this time

The offer from Portland Timbers for Fabio Lima 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.

Transfer targets

No deal for Maizon Rodríguez at that price

Spartak Moscow offered $3.3M; Krasnodar 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.

Market

Yves Bissouma raises the bar for Spartak Moscow

“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Spartak Moscow heard it as anything else.

Squad

Manfred Ugalde in a row with a teammate

It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Spartak Moscow this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.

Squad

Marquinhos 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.

Loan watch

Ilja Svinov has seen enough of Esteghlal

“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 Spartak Moscow, and 3 appearances in 27 say he has earned the hearing.

The dugout

Manfred Ugalde 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 Manfred Ugalde trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.

The dugout

Yuma Suzuki has become a man the manager trusts

Nobody at Spartak Moscow 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.

Squad

Amir Saipi slips down the pecking order

The demotion a club never announces and a dressing room always notices. Amir Saipi is further from the side than he was, and the reason will not be given until he asks.

In brief

83 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

28 Feb 2028
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Match

The view from the top for Spartak Moscow

76 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.

Transfer targets

Spartak Moscow make their move for Maizon Rodríguez

$3.3M on the table at Krasnodar. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.

Transfer targets

Deadline beats Spartak Moscow to Juan Manuel Boselli

The clock did what Sochi would not, and ended it. Supporters who watched the countdown will spend the next window doing it again.

Boardroom

Spartak Moscow close the window on a squad of their own making

2 in and 7 out, and no more changes for months. The manager has what he has, the supporters have their opinion of it, and the table will have the last word.

Market

Marquinhos wants European nights

The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.

Transfer targets

Door shut on François Kamano

Spartak Moscow asked and Sochi said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.

Market

Spartak Moscow turn down Rodina for Artem Bykovskiy

The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.

Squad

Tempers go at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde 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.

Squad

Words at Spartak Moscow training over how hard people work

Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Hendrik Bonmann 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.

In brief

82 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

21 Feb 2028
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Market

Rosenborg come back empty-handed

The bid was some way short and Spartak Moscow did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.

Market

Spartak Moscow sign Sebastián Arce for $5.6M

The paperwork is done: Sebastián Arce joins from Rodina in a deal worth $5.6M. Now comes the harder part.

The dugout

Ivan Lepskiy keeps the receipts

“I remember the meeting. I remember exactly what was promised in it.” Spartak Moscow may remember it differently, which is precisely the problem.

Squad

Sebastián Arce 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. Sebastián Arce has, at Spartak Moscow, and the first month will show what that does to a man.

Squad

Yves Bissouma wants to go home

“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 Spartak Moscow know it.

Squad

Tempers go at Spartak Moscow

Hendrik Bonmann 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.

Market

Mirlind Daku wants European nights

The general version of this complaint is that a player wants more. The specific version names the thing: he wants to walk out under floodlights against clubs from other countries, and he has stopped pretending otherwise.

Squad

A row about effort at Spartak Moscow

Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Marquinhos was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.

The dugout

No hiding place for Christopher Wooh

“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Christopher Wooh, and the manager let it.

In brief

81 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

14 Feb 2028
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Transfer targets

Spartak Moscow agree $5.6M for Sebastián Arce

The clubs have shaken hands with Rodina; the player has not yet. Personal terms are next, and personal terms are where more deals die than anybody prints.

Market

Rosenborg come back empty-handed

The bid was some way short and Spartak Moscow did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.

Market

Marquinhos wants to know where this is going

“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 Spartak Moscow hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.

Squad

Home is on Yuma Suzuki's mind

“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; Spartak Moscow are dealing with a man who wants a different country.

Squad

A falling-out at Spartak Moscow

Manfred Ugalde and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.

Transfer targets

Door shut on Darko Todorović

Spartak Moscow asked and Fakel said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.

Squad

A row about effort at Spartak Moscow

Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Hendrik Bonmann was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.

The dugout

No hiding place for Alexander Djiku

“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Alexander Djiku, and the manager let it.

Market

Rodina join the queue for Artem Bykovskiy

Add another name to the list: Rodina have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Artem Bykovskiy. The answer from Spartak Moscow has not changed — yet.

In brief

80 Edition

The Spartak Moscow Gazette

7 Feb 2028
From our football correspondent Upbeat

Squad

The knee: Daniil Denisov out for 16 days

16 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Spartak Moscow lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.

Match

Spartak Moscow tear Akhmat apart

Rarely has this fixture seen a display like it: 5‑0 against Akhmat, and it could have been more.

Match

Spartak Moscow finish in position 1

76 points, and the season has a number on it. Whatever it felt like from the inside, this is what it will look like in a book.

Market

Fabio Lima turns Fakel down

“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.

Market

Ivan Lepskiy has said yes to Torpedo-BelAZ

The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Spartak Moscow have lost him in all but the paperwork.

Market

Alesson is a Spartak Moscow player

The fee is $5.4M, the contract is signed, and the argument about whether he is worth it can begin. Torpedo Moscow drove a hard bargain; time will say who won it.

Market

Amir Saipi 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 Spartak Moscow can pretend not to have heard.

Player ratings

Fabio Lima, 34, rolls back the years — 8.25

There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.25 at 34, and nobody on the pitch was better.

Squad

Alesson gets the move he always wanted

Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Alesson has just signed for Spartak Moscow, and for once the answer mattered.

In brief