Karim Giraev

Karim Giraev came through the academy at Anji Makhachkala, spending four years with the reserve side, Anji-2, in the Second League and the Russian Youth Championship before senior football took him away from Dagestan. His path since has run almost entirely through the lower tiers of Russian football, club after club, mostly on free transfers. A loan at Legion-Dynamo gave him his first taste of senior football, and spells at Biolog-Novokubansk and Dynamo Makhachkala followed before he settled at Akron Togliatti, where he stayed three years and scored eight goals in 60 First League appearances.

The 2024–2025 season at FC Murom was his most productive: 32 matches and five goals in the Second League Division A, a campaign that ended with the club taking the silver medal in the division. It was also the platform for his next move — on 4 July 2025, Giraev signed for Veles Moscow as a free agent on a contract running to 30 June 2027.

He has never been capped by Russia at any level, senior or youth, and his career has brought no individual awards or top-scorer titles. What stands out instead is durability: since leaving Anji's system he has rarely stayed still, moving through Arsenal Tula and Tekstilshchik Ivanovo in quick succession during 2023 and 2024 before finding a longer run of form at Murom.