Here's what Strelkov said (forever seething about himself losing Sloviansk back in 2014):

https://wartranslated.com/igor-girkins-commentary-on-the-prospects-of-russian-offensive-after-capture-of-soledar/

So far, there is no discussion even about the capture of Bakhmut, because the battles for this city continue. And it has been under siege for a long time. Therefore, to say that “we will soon go to Sloviansk” can only be corrected: “relatively soon.”

In general, my position on the operation, which is being carried out by the Russian military command in the Donbas, is quite well known and is defined by the words: “It is yet to be done.” All over the world, it has long been customary to bypass defense nodes, to force the enemy to leave them without a fight. And we decided to act according to the patterns of the First World War, and in its worst versions.

It’s hard for me to say when our troops will reach the line Sloviansk, Kramatorsk, Druzhkovka, Konstantinovka. Maybe relatively soon, maybe not very soon. Maybe in the coming months, they won’t reach it at all, there is a fairly large foreground there and the “respectable Ukrainian partners” will not leave it without a fight

But in any case, even if we reach this line, it will be a pity if these cities are also destroyed during offensive operations, as Bakhmut has now been destroyed.

And it will be even more difficult to take them because they are much larger, much more strongly fortified. If in Soledar before the start of the special operation, the population was just over ten thousand people, then Kramotorsk until 2014 was a city of 150 thousand people. No Wagner is enough to take the agglomeration by storm. This will require way more forces.

Frankly, I do not share the victorious, and, as they say, ura-patriotic moods of our media after the capture of Soledar. After all, this victory means practically nothing compared to, just for example, the surrender of Kherson. And even the surrender of the much larger city of Izyum, which happened during the so-called regrouping, but in fact, it was a retreat of our troops from the Kharkiv region.

Sloviansk being probably what u/RipleywasRightLV426 meant saying "Next to Bakhmut is one of the Ukrainian biggest rail links for the entire east".

Kherson city was nearly 30 x larger than Soledar, not even counting all the other towns taken alongside it. They're not very known, because Ukraine doesn't fight "worst WWI style" as Stelkov calls it, so they were being just being bypassed or attacked from the rear and quickly taken and so you never even heard of when for example Velyka Oleksandrivka (more than half of Soledar in size) was taken from the VDV in about 1 day.

Hoped it cleared it up a bit for you (both of you).