Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Orel waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Veles is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
“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 The request is on a desk at Veles, and it is not being withdrawn.
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 1‑3, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Veles has been clear about where Artur Koloskov stands, which is more than many ever get.
The dugoutOleg Smirnov has become a man the manager trusts
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The Veles Post
31 Aug 2026
From our football correspondentUpbeat
Match29 Aug 2026
Karim Giraev wins it after the whistle should have gone
92 minutes played. Karim Giraev found the finish in time that only existed because of earlier delays, and Sibir went from a point to nothing inside one movement.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Kuban Holding waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Veles is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
Dmitry Sadov and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Karim Giraev. 2‑1 against Sibir, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
7 signings in three months. Every one of them may be an upgrade and the team can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild that never appears in the transfer-window verdicts.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Veles can pretend not to have heard.
Dmitry Sadov 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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 20-year-old it feels ownership of. Yegor Sysoev 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.
Marked 8.13 — 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.
Involvement in 2 goals, from a player who spent the ninety minutes doing the thing a manager actually wants: being where the ball was going to end up. 7.96 beside his name.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Veles this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
At 20 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
8.24. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
The system has changed and his position has not. A footballer can improve his form; he cannot improve the manager’s formation, and that is the whole of the problem.
“We earned that. I asked them for a reaction and I got one, and now I want the same again on Saturday.” Aleksei Zuev on a 2‑1 afternoon that pleased him more than he was prepared to show.
Dmitry Sadov 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.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Radomir Zuev is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Oleg Rodionov has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Artem Savinov is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Marked 7.29 on an afternoon he ran from the first whistle to the last. Whatever else went wrong, Veles had the best player on the pitch.
The dugout10 Aug 2026
The view from the dugout
“We did not lose. Some weeks that is all you get, and I would rather have the point than not.” Aleksei Zuev chose the glass-half-full version of 0‑0; the supporters left with the other one.
The name of Matvey Zakharzhevskiy has come up in conversations Veles were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Still no offer on the table, and Kirill Korolkov’s deal keeps shrinking. In boardroom language, silence this long stops being an oversight and starts being an answer.
The dugout3 Aug 2026
The manager’s verdict
“That is on me. I pick the team and I picked wrong.” Managers say that when they mean it and when they need to be seen to, and after 1‑2 Aleksei Zuev left the room before anybody could ask which.
6 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.