“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Vitebsk can pretend not to have heard.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Dušan Vukelić will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Vitebsk the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Yevhen Protasov and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Péter Kiss-Szemán was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Nobody at Vitebsk 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.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Nikita Bylinkin’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Vitebsk needing him to play as if none of it matters.
Nothing in writing and nothing in public: a word about playing time, given face to face at Vitebsk. The team sheets over the next month will show whether it was worth having.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Vitebsk know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
In brief
The dugoutEvgeniy Novykh asks for a word with the manager
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Nikita Vekhtev will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Vitebsk the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Beaten 0‑1, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Squad17 Apr 2028
Words at Vitebsk training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Milad Mohammadi 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.
Nikita Bylinkin and a teammate went at it, and not about football. Training grounds are small places and a long season makes them smaller.
Squad17 Apr 2028
9 new faces, and Vitebsk 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 dugout17 Apr 2028
The manager’s verdict
“That is on me. I pick the team and I picked wrong.” Managers say that when they mean it and when they need to be seen to, and after 0‑1 Yahor Shikavka left the room before anybody could ask which.
20 days on the announcement, and a year of quiet, unwatched rehabilitation behind it. Vitebsk lose a player for a season; he loses something harder to name.
A 2‑1 win over Lokomotiv Gomel, a place in the next round, and the quiet arithmetic every supporter does on the walk home: how many more until a final?
The hardest thing about being 20 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Yegor Yunusov did not need any: 7.76, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
7.57, 1 on the scoresheet, and the specific comedy of a back-four player celebrating like somebody who does this every week. He does not, and that is exactly why the ground reacted the way it did.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Vitebsk is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
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.
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.
27 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Vitebsk lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Vitebsk, and it is not being withdrawn.
7.46, 1 on the scoresheet, and the specific comedy of a back-four player celebrating like somebody who does this every week. He does not, and that is exactly why the ground reacted the way it did.
At 22 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
Something was said to Vsevolod Yermakov and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
34 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Vitebsk lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Vitebsk is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Squad27 Mar 2028
Words at Vitebsk training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Milad Mohammadi is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Vitebsk this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
Baranovichi next, and one man in the Vitebsk dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought of him.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Vitebsk know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
“I did not come here to warm up in front of people.” He is out of contract eventually, he is old enough to count the weeks, and Vitebsk will have to give him a reason to stay or an exit.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Vitebsk they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Successful dribbles: 26. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
4 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Vitebsk has to find a result from somewhere.
Squad20 Mar 2028
Words at Vitebsk training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Milad Mohammadi 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.
Yevhen Protasov was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
“I have done everything asked of me in training and it has not changed a thing on a Saturday.” The most familiar complaint in football, and one Vitebsk will have to answer with minutes or with a transfer.
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Nikita Bylinkin has his answer from Vitebsk; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Evgeniy Novykh will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Vitebsk the goodbyes have quietly begun.
There is a level at which a footballer stops being tested and starts being contained, and he reached it some time ago. Vitebsk know it, and so does everybody who watches him.
9 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.
The dugout13 Mar 2028
The view from the dugout
“We will look at it, we will learn from it, and we go again.” The three sentences every manager keeps for a 0‑1 defeat, delivered by Yahor Shikavka to a room that had heard them before.
The dugout13 Mar 2028
The manager has not finished forgetting Nikita Naumov's mistake
Publicly it is behind everybody. It is not behind the man who picks the team, and the only place that shows is a team sheet. He will get another chance; he will get it in a match that matters less.
Signings arrive with a picture of the club in their head, and this one’s picture was bigger than the building. He will play well and he will be gone, in that order, and everybody knows it.
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Vitebsk people have started saying his name in the past tense.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Vitebsk have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Every footballer has an answer to the question about his boyhood club, and most of them never get to act on it. Eslit Sala has, at Vitebsk, and the first month will show what that does to a man.
Boardroom6 Mar 2028
5 academy players handed senior numbers at Vitebsk
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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Milad Mohammadi was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The paperwork is done long before the player is. Matvey Kovruk has agreed terms to come here when his current deal runs out, which means Vitebsk have spent a summer's transfer budget on a phone call.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Uladzislau Nekhaichik has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Uni-X Labs waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Vitebsk is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
He arrived for a fee and leaves for a fraction of it. $27.4K of what Vitebsk paid for Vladislav Fezhenko is money the club will not see again, and the boardroom will be asked about it for two seasons.
The deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 3 arrived, 8 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed one.
Vitebsk asked and Dinamo Brest said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
A deal that was a phone call from completion at lunchtime was dead by midnight. Vitebsk will try again when the window opens; Uni-X Labs may not be selling by then.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Yevhen Protasov was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Vitebsk this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Vitebsk have lost him in all but the paperwork.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Vitebsk have done the hard part with Dinamo Brest, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
Evgeniy Krasnov 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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Baranovichi have kept their man, and Vitebsk go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
Add another name to the list: Orsha have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Vladislav Pulkach. The answer from Vitebsk has not changed — yet.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Vladislav Pulkach was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Vitebsk can pretend not to have heard.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Vitebsk have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Evgeniy Novykh will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Vitebsk the goodbyes have quietly begun.
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.
Nobody will confirm this and nothing else explains the last month of selections. A costly error buys a player a period of being second choice that is always longer than the error was.
Vitebsk have made the call to Baranovichi. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Vitebsk, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Slutsk waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Vitebsk is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
A bone, which is the one injury with a calendar attached. Vitebsk will name a return date and, unusually for this business, will probably be right about it.
The offer from Volna Pinsk for Nikita Vekhtev 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Vitebsk this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Vitebsk have gone to Slutsk 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.
The phone has started ringing about Dušan Vukelić again, and this time the name on the line is Baranovichi. Vitebsk are listening politely and promising nothing.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Sergey Zapalatskiy and Vitebsk agree another 3 years.
He is doing his job and he is not settling. Vitebsk were supposed to be a step up in his own reckoning, and his own reckoning has been adjusted since he arrived.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Lida waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Vitebsk is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Vitebsk will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Mikhail Bashilov 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.
Vitebsk asked and Dinamo Brest said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Vitebsk has been clear about where Nikita Naumov stands, which is more than many ever get.
Mikhail Bashilov 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.
Nobody at Vitebsk will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Vitebsk know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Abdula Kichukov trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
He looks like a man who lives here now rather than one who is working here. It took most of a season, and at Vitebsk the difference is visible from the back of the stand.
“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 dugout17 Jan 2028
Nikita Naumov is still being punished for one mistake
Nobody will confirm it and the team sheets confirm it every week. One error has bought him a spell as second choice that is already longer than the error deserved.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Vitebsk, and both men came out saying it was fine.
“I have done everything asked of me in training and it has not changed a thing on a Saturday.” The most familiar complaint in football, and one Vitebsk will have to answer with minutes or with a transfer.
Position 11 on 33 points, with the season drifting toward the summer. It is the safest place in football and the hardest one to sell a season ticket from.
“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 Vitebsk, and it is not being withdrawn.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Vitebsk this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The dugout10 Jan 2028
The manager has not finished forgetting Kirill Rodionov's mistake
Publicly it is behind everybody. It is not behind the man who picks the team, and the only place that shows is a team sheet. He will get another chance; he will get it in a match that matters less.
In brief
The dugoutDevid Kokoev knocks on the manager’s door
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Vitebsk this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Dmitriy Kharitonov trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
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.
Nobody at Vitebsk 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.
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 Evgeniy Krasnov is on it.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Vitebsk, and both men came out saying it was fine.
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 list is a quiet document with a loud meaning. Dmitriy Kharitonov may talk to anybody who asks, and everybody at the club understands what that means.
The standards have slipped, and in a building where everybody watches everybody it has not gone unremarked. This is how a player loses a place before he loses one.
“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 Vitebsk, and it is not being withdrawn.
Mikhail Bashilov and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
The dugout20 Dec 2027
Nikita Naumov is still being punished for one mistake
Nobody will confirm it and the team sheets confirm it every week. One error has bought him a spell as second choice that is already longer than the error deserved.
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 Evgeniy Novykh is on it.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Vitebsk know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Vitebsk, and both men came out saying it was fine.
“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 Vitebsk, and it is not being withdrawn.
Mikhail Bashilov 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.
Nobody will confirm it and the team sheets confirm it every week. One error has bought him a spell as second choice that is already longer than the error deserved.
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.
“I did not come here to warm up in front of people.” He is out of contract eventually, he is old enough to count the weeks, and Vitebsk will have to give him a reason to stay or an exit.
“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 Vitebsk, and it is not being withdrawn.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Vitebsk this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The demotion a club never announces and a dressing room always notices. Nikita Vekhtev is further from the side than he was, and the reason will not be given until he asks.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Vladislav Pulkach was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“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 Vitebsk, and it is not being withdrawn.
Mikhail Bashilov 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.
Nobody will confirm this and nothing else explains the last month of selections. A costly error buys a player a period of being second choice that is always longer than the error was.
Every 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 Evgeniy Novykh is on it.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Vitebsk know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
“I respect the manager and I am not going to sit here and pretend I am happy.” It is the most common sentence in football and it has never once been the end of a story.
Nobody writes a headline about a tutor. Nobody has to be told, either, what happens to a signing who spends two years being the man nobody can talk to at lunch.
Evgeniy Krasnov was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
“I did not go to Uni-X Labs to sit and watch. I want to come back to Vitebsk and fight for my place.” 1 appearances in 9 matches say the rest.
The dugout15 Nov 2027
The manager has not finished forgetting Kirill Rodionov's mistake
Publicly it is behind everybody. It is not behind the man who picks the team, and the only place that shows is a team sheet. He will get another chance; he will get it in a match that matters less.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Nikita Naumov trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Squad15 Nov 2027
Words at Vitebsk training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Maxim Kuntsevich 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.
“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 Vitebsk, and it is not being withdrawn.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Nikita Naumov trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Squad8 Nov 2027
Words at Vitebsk training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Maxim Kuntsevich is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Every 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 Ivan Grudko is on it.
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 Vitebsk would admit. It shows on Saturdays.
The coaching staff have set Soslan Dzarasov something separate to do. Whether it is a weakness being addressed or a strength being sharpened, nobody outside the building will know until it shows up on a Saturday.
In brief
BoardroomThe Vitebsk production line keeps running
The dugoutThe manager plants his flag on Lan Milanović
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Vitebsk have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Konstantin Magaletskiy and Vitebsk agree another 1 years.
Nobody at Vitebsk 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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Vitebsk can pretend not to have heard.
Mikhail Bashilov 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.
Nobody makes a documentary about a hamstring and everybody in the game fears one. Vitebsk will be careful with the return date, because the second one is always worse than the first.
Nobody will confirm this and nothing else explains the last month of selections. A costly error buys a player a period of being second choice that is always longer than the error was.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Maxim Kuntsevich was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Vitebsk has been clear about where Abdula Kichukov stands, which is more than many ever get.
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.
2 in front and in complete control, and it finished with Dnepr Mogilev the happier side. There is no version of this afternoon that Vitebsk will enjoy reviewing.
Mikhail Bashilov was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Hard to beat is not the same as winning, but 6 matches without defeat is a foundation Vitebsk did not have in the autumn.
Player ratings18 Oct 2027
Radivoj Bosić was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.03. 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.
100 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.
“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 Vitebsk, and 1 appearances in 5 say he has earned the hearing.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Vitebsk this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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 Ivan Grudko is on it.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Vitebsk, and both men came out saying it was fine.
“I respect the manager and I am not going to sit here and pretend I am happy.” It is the most common sentence in football and it has never once been the end of a story.
The language has come, the shrug has gone, and he argues in training like a man who expects to be here next year. None of it shows up on a fee and all of it shows up on the pitch.
Next up on the road: Dnepr Mogilev, position 5. The supporters who go will talk about it all week and the ones who do not will check their phones at ten to five.
A mark of 7.98 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 21-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Vitebsk can pretend not to have heard.
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 7.81 for the rest of it.
At 23 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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Vitebsk can pretend not to have heard.
Evgeniy Krasnov 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.
Nobody will confirm this and nothing else explains the last month of selections. A costly error buys a player a period of being second choice that is always longer than the error was.
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Vladlen Anikeev has his answer from Vitebsk; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
“A point is a point and I will take it, but we should have had all three.” Yahor Shikavka after the 0‑0 draw, and the sentence every manager in the country said at some stage this weekend.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Vladislav Pulkach was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The crowd waited for a goal that never came. Dinamo Minsk defended in numbers and left with what they came for, and the two sides could be playing still without troubling a scorer.
“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 Vitebsk, and it is not being withdrawn.
The deal that would have taken Alexandr Burnos to Isloch has collapsed at the last stage, and he reports back to Vitebsk with a summer to forget and a season still to play. Nobody is saying which side walked away.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Vitebsk have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Player ratings20 Sep 2027
Up for the corner, and Marin Žgomba delivers — 7.78
Centre-halves are allowed forward twice a season and are judged on what they do when they get there. Marin Žgomba scored, was marked 7.78, and got back before anybody noticed he had gone.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Vsevolod Yermakov is living that version at Vitebsk, and it tends to show in the first month.
It happens to all of them and it is still the hardest paragraph a local paper has to write. 34 years old, 3 points down on where he was, and a body that has started charging interest on a career.
Everything was agreed until it was not, and Dmitriy Kharitonov reports back to Vitebsk with a summer to forget. Neither club is saying who walked away from the table.
1 for Marin Žgomba, marked 7.67, and a centre-half's name in the part of the report he normally only reaches by mistake. He will not be allowed to forget it in the dressing room for a month.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Vitebsk have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
The deadline has passed and the squad is the squad. 13 arrived, 10 left, and everything else printed about this club last month was a rumour that stayed one.
Vitebsk had done everything except persuade the man himself. He stays at Smorgon, and the manager goes back to the drawing board with the money still in the bank.
At 22 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Vitebsk this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Soslan Dzarasov has just signed for Vitebsk, and for once the answer mattered.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Dinamo Minsk have kept their man, and Vitebsk go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Vitebsk have lost him in all but the paperwork.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Vitebsk can pretend not to have heard.
“I pick players who do the work. All of it.” No name was spoken; every camera still turned to Nikita Naumov, and the manager let it.
Squad6 Sep 2027
Words at Vitebsk training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Evgeniy Novykh 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 last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Vitebsk have lost him in all but the paperwork.
“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 Vitebsk, and it is not being withdrawn.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Vitebsk have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
7.71, 1 on the scoresheet, and the specific comedy of a back-four player celebrating like somebody who does this every week. He does not, and that is exactly why the ground reacted the way it did.
The phone has started ringing about Alexandr Burnos again, and this time the name on the line is Isloch. Vitebsk are listening politely and promising nothing.
Mikhail Bashilov and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
A player who expected to start watched it instead. The manager will call it a decision for the team; Nikita Naumov will call it something else in private.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Belshina waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Vitebsk is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
The offer from Slutsk for Dmitriy Kharitonov 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.
“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 Vitebsk, and it is not being withdrawn.
The clubs have shaken hands with Smorgon; the player has not yet. Personal terms are next, and personal terms are where more deals die than anybody prints.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Vitebsk have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Mikhail Bashilov was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 0‑1, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
Squad23 Aug 2027
Words at Vitebsk training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Evgeniy Novykh 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
The dugoutNikita Naumov is still being punished for one mistake
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Vitebsk have lost him in all but the paperwork.
At 2 goals adrift this was a formality, and the formality lasted right up until it did not. Vitebsk found something the first half had given no notice of, and Arsenal Dzerzhinsk could not hold what they had.
12 matches without a win, and then this, against Arsenal Dzerzhinsk. Relief is a strange noise in a football ground and it was the only noise at the end.
7.46, 1 on the scoresheet, and the specific comedy of a back-four player celebrating like somebody who does this every week. He does not, and that is exactly why the ground reacted the way it did.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Vitebsk this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
A 4‑2 win over Arsenal Dzerzhinsk, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Vitebsk asked and Stal Mielec said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Vitebsk told Marin Žgomba something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Vitebsk, and both men came out saying it was fine.
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.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Nikita Bylinkin’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Vitebsk needing him to play as if none of it matters.
“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 Vitebsk, and it is not being withdrawn.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Lokomotiv Gomel waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Vitebsk is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
11 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Vitebsk have lost him in all but the paperwork.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Vitebsk can pretend not to have heard.
Mikhail Bashilov was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Vitebsk people have started saying his name in the past tense.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Vitebsk this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Add another name to the list: Ostrovets have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Vladislav Pulkach. The answer from Vitebsk has not changed — yet.
A loan enquiry to Nizhniy Novgorod: cover, or a look at somebody the club cannot afford to buy yet. Either way the answer will come back inside the week.
Clubs make promises constantly and the page usually only hears about them when they are broken. This one was honoured, and the dressing room noticed that faster than any supporter did.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Vitebsk can pretend not to have heard.
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.
$5.0K was the most the club would pay and Gomel 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.
The phone has started ringing about Evgeniy Novykh again, and this time the name on the line is Orsha. Vitebsk are listening politely and promising nothing.
Vitebsk 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.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the whole of the defence. 6 saves, several of them the kind nobody expects to see made, and ten outfield players who owe him a drink.
5 matches, no goals, and a training ground that has tried everything. It will end — droughts always do — but nobody at Vitebsk can tell you which week it ends in.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Vitebsk is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
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.
Mikhail Bashilov 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.
Vitebsk have gone to Gomel 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.
Vitebsk asked and Baltika 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 last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Vitebsk have lost him in all but the paperwork.
The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 4 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
Mikhail Bashilov 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.
Vitebsk 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.
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Vitebsk people have started saying his name in the past tense.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Vitebsk this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 3 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
Vitebsk asked and Dinamo Brest said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Evgeniy Novykh will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Vitebsk the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Vladislav Fezhenko 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.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Yahor Shikavka after 0‑2, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Evgeniy Novykh was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
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 Evgeniy Krasnov is on it.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 11 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Nikita Vekhtev will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Vitebsk the goodbyes have quietly begun.
16 combined actions and 7.34. The job he did is the one that shows up as other people looking good, and the only reliable way to notice it is to watch what happens on the afternoons he is missing.
Mikhail Bashilov and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Vitebsk, and 2 appearances in 18 say he has earned the hearing.
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.
Mikhail Bashilov 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.
10 combined actions and 7.63. The job he did is the one that shows up as other people looking good, and the only reliable way to notice it is to watch what happens on the afternoons he is missing.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Evgeniy Novykh was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Vitebsk told Ivan Grudko something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
“There are things I liked and things we will be doing on Tuesday until they are right.” 1‑1, and a manager who had already decided what Tuesday looked like.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Vitebsk this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Successful dribbles: 17. 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.
“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 dugout24 May 2027
Radivoj Bosić is still being punished for one mistake
Nobody will confirm it and the team sheets confirm it every week. One error has bought him a spell as second choice that is already longer than the error deserved.
Squad24 May 2027
Words at Vitebsk training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Evgeniy Novykh is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
“It is not the end of the world and it is not good enough. Both of those are true.” The manager, after a 0‑0 draw, said the honest thing and then went to say it again inside.
There were 89 minutes on the clock and Orsha had all but banked the point. Football rarely reads the room, and Vitebsk did not stop to explain themselves.
“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 Vitebsk, and it is not being withdrawn.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Vitebsk is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
He is 21 and the ground already sings his name, which is a thing that happens to local boys and almost never to signings. Everything from here is measured against an affection he did nothing to earn except be from here.
5 without a win is the sort of run that changes how a town talks about its club, and Orsha were the afternoon it stopped. Nothing is fixed by one result and everything feels different by one.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Vitebsk they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Mikhail Bashilov and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
“I watch every Vitebsk game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Smorgon runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
4 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
Evgeniy Krasnov 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.
Successful dribbles: 20. There was always a defender in front of him and there was never a defender in front of him for long.
Squad3 May 2027
Words at Vitebsk training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Evgeniy Novykh is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
“Nobody 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 dugout3 May 2027
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.” Yahor Shikavka chose the glass-half-full version of 0‑0; the supporters left with the other one.
Nothing is announced when this happens and everybody knows. He is a bigger part of the plan at Vitebsk than he was a month ago, and the training ground worked that out before the team sheet said so.
Ninety specific minutes wanted a different sort of player, and the manager picked one. He is not out of form and he is not in the side, and both are true.
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.
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.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Nikita Bylinkin’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Vitebsk needing him to play as if none of it matters.
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 Nikita Bylinkin has written the date down.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Evgeniy Novykh will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Vitebsk the goodbyes have quietly begun.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Vitebsk this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“We were not good enough today and I am not going to dress it up.” Yahor Shikavka after 1‑2, in the tone of a man who knows the next question and does not intend to answer it.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Evgeniy Novykh was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The dugout19 Apr 2027
Devid Kokoev is still being punished for one mistake
Nobody will confirm it and the team sheets confirm it every week. One error has bought him a spell as second choice that is already longer than the error deserved.
Nobody at Vitebsk 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.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the whole of the defence. 6 saves, several of them the kind nobody expects to see made, and ten outfield players who owe him a drink.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Vitebsk is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Mikhail Bashilov was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
“I watch every Vitebsk game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Smorgon runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Evgeniy Novykh was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
“A point is a point and I will take it, but we should have had all three.” Yahor Shikavka after the 0‑0 draw, and the sentence every manager in the country said at some stage this weekend.
Cup ties wait for somebody to seize them, and Roman Minaev obliged against Lokomotiv Gomel. 3‑0 on the night, and the name in the next round’s hat is Vitebsk.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 20 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
Mikhail Bashilov 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.
At 34, 3 points below where he was, and a body that has started charging interest. It happens to all of them and it is still the hardest paragraph on this page.
Successful dribbles: 20. 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.
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.
“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.
Squad29 Mar 2027
7 new faces, and Vitebsk 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.
Squad29 Mar 2027
Words at Vitebsk training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Evgeniy Novykh is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Nobody will confirm it and the team sheets confirm it every week. One error has bought him a spell as second choice that is already longer than the error deserved.
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.
Dinamo Brest next, and one man in the Vitebsk dressing room knows their training ground better than his own. The reception will tell him what they thought of him.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Alexandr Anufriev signs something — a contract at Vitebsk or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Radivoj Bosić had done his part in building a 2-goal cushion. What happened after that was collective, and Naftan were allowed back into a match that had been finished with.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Vitebsk is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Vitebsk this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“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; Vitebsk are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Successful dribbles: 16. He went past people as if he had been told there was a prize for it, and by the end the full-back had stopped pretending to try.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
“There are things I liked and things we will be doing on Tuesday until they are right.” 2‑2, and a manager who had already decided what Tuesday looked like.
Ninety minutes of very little, and then everything at once. The winner arrived in the 87th, and Isloch spent what remained of the match appealing to the referee rather than chasing the ball.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Vitebsk they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Evgeniy Krasnov 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.
100 games in this shirt, through managers and relegations and everything else. Service like it is disappearing from the game and the crowd knows what it is watching.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Vitebsk have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 6 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
The offer from Osipovichi for Evgeniy Novykh was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
The deal that would have taken Dmitriy Kharitonov to Minsk has collapsed at the last stage, and he reports back to Vitebsk with a summer to forget and a season still to play. Nobody is saying which side walked away.
Nikita Naumov 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.
Senior shirt numbers handed to boys the coaches have known since they were twelve. Most will not make it and all of them have already done the hard part.
“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; Vitebsk are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
“I listened, I thought about it, and I am staying. That is the whole story.” The clubs had agreed a fee. Roman Lisovskiy had not agreed to go, which turned out to be the part that mattered.
Boardroom1 Mar 2027
Vitebsk close the window on a squad of their own making
7 in and 3 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.
“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 Vitebsk know it.
The phone has started ringing about Evgeniy Novykh again, and this time the name on the line is Osipovichi. Vitebsk are listening politely and promising nothing.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Primorje have kept their man, and Vitebsk go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
7 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.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Evgeniy Novykh was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
Fee agreed, wages agreed, and Dinamo Brest waiting with a shirt. Nobody at Vitebsk is pretending otherwise, and the supporters have stopped asking whether and started asking when.
The offer from Smorgon for Nikita Vekhtev 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Vitebsk this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Nobody will confirm this and nothing else explains the last month of selections. A costly error buys a player a period of being second choice that is always longer than the error was.
Slavia Prague have been asked whether they would lend him. Loans are agreed quickly or not at all, and this one will be one or the other by the weekend.
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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Vitebsk can pretend not to have heard.
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Vitebsk people have started saying his name in the past tense.
Mikhail Bashilov 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.
Signings arrive with a picture of the club in their head, and this one’s picture was bigger than the building. He will play well and he will be gone, in that order, and everybody knows it.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Vitebsk have made the call to CSKA Moscow. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
The clubs have settled the fee and he has settled his wages. What remains is a medical and a photograph, and around Vitebsk people have started saying his name in the past tense.
Position 13 and 6 points, and the table gets read bottom-up in this part of town. The calendar has stopped being a schedule and started being a countdown.
The clubs have shaken hands with Uni-X Labs; the player has not yet. Personal terms are next, and personal terms are where more deals die than anybody prints.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Vitebsk can pretend not to have heard.
The offer from Dinamo Minsk for Dmitriy Kharitonov 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.
Mikhail Bashilov 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.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Abdula Kichukov is living that version at Vitebsk, and it tends to show in the first month.
Molodechno paid $130.0K and Vitebsk took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Akhmat Grozny have kept their man, and Vitebsk go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
“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.
He is going to Dinamo Brest, the club has $210.0K it did not have on Friday, and the phone-ins have already decided how they feel about that. Selling well and selling somebody they loved are not the same skill.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Vitebsk can pretend not to have heard.
Dinamo Brest pay $210.0K, and the deal is done. The number reads well on a balance sheet; whether it reads well on the pitch is next season's question.
The name of Nikita Vekhtev has come up in conversations Vitebsk were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
Vitebsk asked and Dnepr Mogilev said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Vitebsk this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Vitebsk has been clear about where Mikhail Bashilov stands, which is more than many ever get.
Nobody will confirm it and the team sheets confirm it every week. One error has bought him a spell as second choice that is already longer than the error deserved.
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.
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 Roman Minaev is on it.
A new face in his position and a shirt he thought he owned suddenly up for discussion. Vitebsk have promised nothing, which is what clubs promise at this stage.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Evgeniy Novykh will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Vitebsk the goodbyes have quietly begun.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Vitebsk this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
Mikhail Bashilov 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.
He used to be one of the options. He is now one of the men the options are picked around, and the change happened quietly enough that only the dressing room noticed on the day.
Nobody will confirm this and nothing else explains the last month of selections. A costly error buys a player a period of being second choice that is always longer than the error was.
Nobody at Vitebsk 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.
16 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Vitebsk lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Vitebsk this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Nobody will confirm it and the team sheets confirm it every week. One error has bought him a spell as second choice that is already longer than the error deserved.
The words a physio says slowly. 24 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.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Evgeniy Novykh will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Vitebsk the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Roman Minaev 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.
Nobody at Vitebsk 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.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Roman Lisovskiy trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
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.
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 Ivan Grudko is on it.
The demotion a club never announces and a dressing room always notices. Vladlen Anikeev is further from the side than he was, and the reason will not be given until he asks.
Nobody will confirm it and the team sheets confirm it every week. One error has bought him a spell as second choice that is already longer than the error deserved.
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 Evgeniy Novykh is on it.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Ivan Grudko trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
Nobody will confirm it and the team sheets confirm it every week. One error has bought him a spell as second choice that is already longer than the error deserved.
Maxim Kuntsevich 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.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Vitebsk they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Mikhail Bashilov was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Every 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 Evgeniy Krasnov is on it.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Vitebsk, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Vitebsk know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Position 13 and 6 points, and the table gets read bottom-up in this part of town. The calendar has stopped being a schedule and started being a countdown.
Mikhail Bashilov 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.
Nobody at Vitebsk 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.
Nobody will confirm it and the team sheets confirm it every week. One error has bought him a spell as second choice that is already longer than the error deserved.
Nobody will confirm this and nothing else explains the last month of selections. A costly error buys a player a period of being second choice that is always longer than the error was.
A month is long enough that nobody gets in by accident. Marin Žgomba is in the division's best eleven for it, which is a quieter compliment than an award and a more reliable one.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Evgeniy Novykh will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Vitebsk the goodbyes have quietly begun.
13 signings in three months. Every one of them may be an upgrade and the team can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild that never appears in the transfer-window verdicts.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Vitebsk, and both men came out saying it was fine.
At 19 he is doing things this season that he could not do last season, and doing them every week. Form comes and goes; this has stayed long enough to be called something else.
1‑1, and both dressing rooms will call it two points lost. A draw that asked plenty of questions and answered none of them.
The dugout19 Oct 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.” Yahor Shikavka chose the glass-half-full version of 1‑1; the supporters left with the other one.
Something was said to Dmitriy Kharitonov and then it happened. In this industry that passes for remarkable, and the dressing room noticed faster than any supporter could.
Nobody at Vitebsk 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.
Maxim Kuntsevich and a teammate said things this week that will take longer than a week to unsay. It was not about football, and both of them play on Saturday.
“I was told straight, and I would rather have it straight.” The manager at Vitebsk has been clear about where Ivan Novichkov stands, which is more than many ever get.
Publicly it is behind everybody. It is not behind the man who picks the team, and the only place that shows is a team sheet. He will get another chance; he will get it in a match that matters less.
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 Evgeniy Novykh is on it.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Vitebsk, and both men came out saying it was fine.
The language has come, the shrug has gone, and he argues in training like a man who expects to be here next year. None of it shows up on a fee and all of it shows up on the pitch.
A few words of the language, a friend at the next peg, and a training ground that has stopped feeling foreign. Nothing measurable, and everything visible on Saturdays.
Next up on the road: Arsenal Dzerzhinsk, position 12. The supporters who go will talk about it all week and the ones who do not will check their phones at ten to five.
A brace, and Marin Žgomba takes the afternoon — 7.69
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Marin Žgomba provided it, and the 7.69 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Vitebsk this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Slutsk will keep picking him until June and will get nothing for him after it. Vladislav Fedosov has pre-agreed a move to Vitebsk, and the only people who lose in that arrangement are the ones who let the contract run down.
The manager has re-ordered his thinking and Alexandr Burnos has come out of it lower. He will be told it is temporary, and the players who have heard that before will avoid his eye.
Nobody will confirm this and nothing else explains the last month of selections. A costly error buys a player a period of being second choice that is always longer than the error was.
Every shape has positions in it and this one does not have his. Vitebsk will either change the shape, change his job, or change his club, and he is waiting to hear which.
Every club pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time it has been tried.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Vitebsk is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Mikhail Bashilov 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.
Nothing happens for months and then he simply arrives, at no cost, having signed a pre-contract while still turning out for somebody else. It is the least dramatic way to sign a footballer and frequently the shrewdest.
12 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.
The dugout28 Sep 2026
The view from the dugout
“We will look at it, we will learn from it, and we go again.” The three sentences every manager keeps for a 1‑3 defeat, delivered by Yahor Shikavka to a room that had heard them before.
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Zakhar Chervyakov has his answer from Vitebsk; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
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 Evgeniy Krasnov is on it.
Mikhail Bashilov 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.
Vitebsk asked and Dukla Prague said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
0‑1 to Torpedo-BelAZ, and no complaints worth printing. The performance asked for nothing more than it got.
The dugout21 Sep 2026
The manager’s verdict
“That is on me. I pick the team and I picked wrong.” Managers say that when they mean it and when they need to be seen to, and after 0‑1 Yahor Shikavka left the room before anybody could ask which.
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 Ivan Grudko is on it.
He used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against Dinamo Minsk in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
Nobody at Vitebsk is suggesting he is out of form. The manager simply wanted somebody with a different set of qualities for ninety specific minutes, and there is nothing a player can train to fix that.
The last thing about a transfer that is still about the player is his signature on his own terms, and it is there. Vitebsk have lost him in all but the paperwork.
Boardroom14 Sep 2026
Deadline passes with 13 signed and 3 gone
That is the business done at Vitebsk until the window opens again. Whether it was enough will be answered on Saturdays rather than in a column, and the first Saturday is close.
Nothing happens for months and then he simply arrives, at no cost, having signed a pre-contract while still turning out for somebody else. It is the least dramatic way to sign a footballer and frequently the shrewdest.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Spartak Kostroma have kept their man, and Vitebsk go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Vitebsk this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Vitebsk asked and Rodina said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
A loan enquiry to Spartak Kostroma: cover, or a look at somebody the club cannot afford to buy yet. Either way the answer will come back inside the week.
The manager has re-ordered his thinking and Kirill Rodionov has come out of it lower. He will be told it is temporary, and the players who have heard that before will avoid his eye.
A month is long enough that nobody gets in by accident. Marin Žgomba is in the division's best eleven for it, which is a quieter compliment than an award and a more reliable one.
Nothing is announced when this happens and everybody knows. He is a bigger part of the plan at Vitebsk than he was a month ago, and the training ground worked that out before the team sheet said so.
Nobody at Vitebsk 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.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Vitebsk can pretend not to have heard.
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 7.41 for the rest of it.
12 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.
16 defensive actions and a clean sheet at the end of them. A defender's afternoon can only be told by what did not happen, which is why nobody makes a highlights package out of one and every manager in the division would take it.
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 Evgeniy Krasnov is on it.
Vitebsk offered $150.0K; Slavia Mozyr 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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Oldham Athletic have kept their man, and Vitebsk go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 2‑3, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.
The dugout24 Aug 2026
The manager has not finished forgetting Radivoj Bosić's mistake
Publicly it is behind everybody. It is not behind the man who picks the team, and the only place that shows is a team sheet. He will get another chance; he will get it in a match that matters less.
Cup ties wait for somebody to seize them, and Brian Leroy Onana obliged against Slonim. 3‑1 on the night, and the name in the next round’s hat is Vitebsk.
Two goals and a mark of 8.70 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
1 for Marin Žgomba, marked 7.32, and a centre-half's name in the part of the report he normally only reaches by mistake. He will not be allowed to forget it in the dressing room for a month.
Vitebsk had done everything except persuade the man himself. He stays at Skonto, and the manager goes back to the drawing board with the money still in the bank.
$140.0K on the table at Slavia Mozyr. The manager wanted him, the board agreed a number, and the only voices still to be heard are the ones at the other club.
Vitebsk asked and Slavia Mozyr said no without discussing a figure. It is the least ambiguous answer in football and the one clubs most often come back to test.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 22-year-old it feels ownership of. Ivan Grudko 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.
Mikhail Bashilov 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.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Dinamo Brest have kept their man, and Vitebsk go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Mikita Chalavach 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.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Valery Kendysh has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Ivan Palitsevich is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Sergei Rios is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Every squad has one of these fixtures for somebody every season. This one is Alexandr Anufriev’s: the club that knew him first, the supporters who will decide in the first minute whether to applaud, and Vitebsk needing him to play as if none of it matters.
Milad Mohammadi 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.
49 months left and silence from upstairs — no offer, no talks, nothing for his people to answer. Clubs that let a calendar do their negotiating usually end up negotiating with the calendar.
14 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.
“The supporters are entitled to be angry. So am I. We will put it right.” 0‑1, a manager saying the necessary things, and a dressing room that heard a different version of them.