Goalkeeper Martin Bogatinov, who has been training with the Karpaty reserves as punishment for not taking a pay cut, has been reinstated to the first team.

Martin Bogatinov, along with five other players who found themselves in a similar position, have been reinstated to the first team of Karpaty.  With Karpaty coming off two consecutive disappointing seasons, which the club management deemed unacceptable, many players heading into this season were told to accept a pay cut or face the possibility of training on their own with the reserves.  The majority of the players declined and were subsequently demoted to the reserves, including Bogatinov.

However, yesterday, Karpaty suddenly decided to reinstate the following six players to the first team: Martin Bogatinov, Ivan Milošević, Ihor Oshchypko, Semir Štilić, Marcelinho and Armand Ella.  What caused the change in strategy by Karpaty was not stated in the team’s press release?  It could mean that the players took a pay cut to regain their place on the first team, or it could signal desperation in Karpaty wanting to reinstate some of their more established players given that the team is off to another bad start this season.

With the return of the six players, the Karpaty squad is now up to 32 players, according to the club’s official website.  That includes four goalkeepers concerning Bogatinov with the other three keepers all being born in 1990 or later.

The next game for Karpaty is on Monday when they go on the road to face rival Volyn, the club of Macedonian international Vanche Shikov.  It should be known then whether any of the reinstated players will be included in the matchday squad by manager Oleksandr Sevidov, currently in his first year on the job after coming over from fellow Ukrainian side Goverla earlier in the summer.

Due to his status with Karpaty for most of the summer, Bogatinov, capped 15 times by Macedonia, has lost his spot on the national team.  Manager Chedomir Janevski has gone with Darko Tofiloski over Bogatinov in the past couple of squads to join fellow keepers Tome Pachovski and Kristijan Naumovski.  If Martin does return to game action for Karpaty now that he has been reinstated, then Bogatinov stands a good chance of returning to the Macedonian squad as well.