I mean they could have cited Russian sources but then a lot of people would say that what they write can't be true because it's coming from biased pro-Russian media. The point of citing western sources is not that they are more accurate (Russian ones most of the time are far more reliable, so long as they're not some random Telegram channels that could very well be Ukrainian psyops for all we know), it's to be able to say to people who distrust Russian sources "look, even the pro-Ukrainian western media admits this".

But i get your point. And the answer is no, we don't have anything more reliable at the moment. There is a lot of fog of war, a lot of propaganda, psyops and fakes being spread by Ukraine, and on the Russian side they have pretty tight opsec.

Personally i would say that the most reliable source throughout this conflict has been the Russian MOD because they tend to be very conservative, unlike the Russian milbloggers and "OSINT" channels and such who will often misreport or fall prey to psyops.

And yes the MOD are sometimes purposely vague and often slow to report developments, but when they report you can be sure it's fairly accurate as enough time has passed that other sources can verify said information. Of course they are biased and will present the information in such a way as to create a better image for themselves, but from my experience they won't outright lie except by omission.