The Wings swept the Wings: Samara club created a sensation away from Zenit

The fight for medals in the Russian soccer championship intensified exactly one round before the winter break. It happened after home defeats of all three leaders in the 17th round. Lokomotiv Moscow lost at home to Khimki (1:3), Zenit St. Petersburg lost to Krylia Sovetov Samara (2:3), and Krasnodar lost to Spartak Moscow (0:3), which thanks to this victory entered the top three. Dynamo Moscow may also join the fight for medals if they beat Akhmat Grozny away on Monday. Meanwhile, CSKA Moscow, which barely escaped a 2-2 defeat at home to Rubin Kazan, is getting further and further away from the leaders.

"Zenit" - "Krylia Sovetov"

After a scandal erupted in Russian soccer earlier in the week over a statement made by Samara Region Governor Vyacheslav Fedorishchev, it seemed that the Krylia Sovetov crisis would continue. It was assumed that the team would be affected not even by the regional head's statement about the 36 million rubles that one of the club's employees had asked for to pay back a debt to "unnamed criminals who are involved in corruption in the referee corps of Russian soccer." A little later, Fedorishchev also spoke out about coaches' salaries in Russian soccer.

- I know precedents, when the coach of not the strongest club receives about 100 million fiks, but there are also bonuses and so on," said the governor. - Excuse me, but 100 million rubles a year is quite a serious remuneration. And then there are these bonuses... I have questions about this... If for some reason he doesn't show a good game, but the community behind him, which is engaged in agency activities, initiates a media campaign to defend him, although, in theory, he should be removed for poor play... 100 million rubles to fire a non-professional, a man who has become a non-professional, that's tou mach.

The regional manager did not directly name Krylia's head coach Igor Osinkin, but part of the soccer community associated these words with the 59-year-old specialist. And on the eve of the match in St. Petersburg, Sport-Express published information that Osinkin took those words personally and expressed a desire to resign. But the club management persuaded him to stay.

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It seemed that all this would further exacerbate the fall crisis of the Krylia, who had not won seven games in a row. True, the series of failures was broken a round earlier thanks to a 2-1 home win over Grozny's Akhmat. But few believed that the Samara side would be able to match the momentum of Zenit, who had won 12 times in the previous 16 rounds, with three draws and one defeat, and just a week ago regained the lead in the table.

The St. Petersburg team took the lead as early as the fourth minute thanks to a goal from Maxim Glushenkov. It seemed like a quick goal started the Krylia rout. But 15 minutes later they took the lead - Ivan Sergeyev and Ivan Oleynikov scored a goal each a minute apart. And at the end of the first half-hour of the match, Sergeyev scored his second goal against his former team. Samara led 3:1.

After that, with Zenit having a serious territorial advantage, the guests courageously kept the winning score. And only once in the 72nd minute allowed Nuraly Alip to reduce the gap from Krylia, which thanks to this victory moved up to tenth place. And Zenit kept the lead only because of the misfire of Krasnodar, which is one point behind the first line.

- It's just an inexplicable result," former national team midfielder Aleksandr Mostovoi shared his opinion with Izvestia. - I don't think anyone would have guessed before the game that it would turn out this way. Zenit's superiority in class is too clear right now. And he usually doesn't give away such meetings. Especially, such as with the current "Krylia", which has a lot of problems, including a scandal in connection with the governor's speeches. And I don't understand how Zenit managed to concede three goals in 12 minutes. Further it is clear that Samara clung to this result and kept it. We can congratulate them on that, but the result is abnormal. Especially now, when Peter could have built up a gap on their rivals after their defeats.

"Krasnodar" - "Spartak".

Since mid-October, "Spartak" began to gain momentum in the championship after failures in the summer and in the first half of the fall. "Krasnodar", in turn, since mid-November also began to give up. A 1-1 away draw with Rubin Kazan, which broke the southern club's 11-match winning streak, didn't look like a big tragedy. But then came a 2-2 away win over Khimki, which was lost in the final minutes, and the Bulls dropped to second place.

"Spartak" was on a spur after a crushing derby victory over "Lokomotiv" (5:2). And even last week's loss to Rostov (0:1; 1:2) in the RPL Cup of Russia was not seen as a sign of trouble, as the Red-Whites' head coach Dejan Stankovic has rotated the squad extensively for this tournament.

In Krasnodar, Manfred Ugalde was once again effective. After four goals against Loko, he scored twice for the Bulls in the middle of the first half and strengthened his lead in the scorer's race - the Costa Rican striker has 14 goals in 17 RPL matches. "Spartak" did not give Krasnodar much of a chance to get back on track, and at the end of the game Esekiel Barco brought the game to a rout.

- Spartak were better by all accounts - in movement, in fighting, not to mention attitude," former Krasnodar midfielder Aleksandr Mostovoi told Izvestia. - We won all the fight, all the battles. Under Stankovic, this is one of the team's best matches, if not the best at all. "Krasnodar" is going through an expected slump - this team can not go without such bad stretches. But its squad is strong, so I'm sure it will still finish in the top three. That's why I'd like to especially commend the play of Spartak, who confidently won the away game against such a strong opponent.

Thanks to their fifth consecutive win, the Red and Whites are level on points with Lokomotiv Moscow, who are in the bottom three, losing only on extra points. Stankovic's team has cut the gap to Zenit to five points.

"Lokomotiv Khimki

The Moscow Region club is stuck in the zone of transition matches in 13th place. It lost a lot of points in matches with neighbors in the table, but managed to take points at home from all three leaders. In August, there was a draw with Zenit (1:1), which was the first loss of points for the Blue and White Blues.

In October, Lokomotiv were beaten 2-0, and in late November Khimki took points away from Krasnodar at home (2-2). However, Frank Artiga's wards were not as successful away against these opponents. "Krasnodar" defeated them in their home walls with a score of 4:0.

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But "Loko" they gave battle at his stadium. In the first half, Anton Zabolotny's goal was quickly answered by Vladislav Sarveli's goal, but soon Zelimkhan Bakayev put Khimki ahead again. Midway through the second half, Lucas Vera doubled his team's lead and brought them a victory over Loko, which did not help them get out of the transition zone, but the Moscow Region club moved closer to their rivals Dinamo Makhachkala and Pari Nizhny Novgorod.

- The decline in Lokomotiv's play is obvious," Nikolai Naumov, former president of the Railwaymen, shared his opinion with Izvestia. - We can see that the defeat at the hands of Spartak and the Russian Cup exit from the RPL Way by Dynamo (2:1; 0:1, on penalties 3:4) was not accidental. We can see that young Alexey Batrakov had had enough at the end of the year, Dmitry Barinov frankly failed in the match with Khimki. And the rest of the team looked unimpressive. Khimki played competently on the counterattack and took advantage of their opponent's problems. The skill of guys like Zabolotny, Bakayev and Vera makes it possible. And their potential showed.

CSKA vs. Rubin

CSKA played a good first half against Rubin, creating many dangerous chances. But the Kazans were saved by their goalkeeper Evgeny Staver. The visitors opened the scoring before halftime thanks to a goal by Mirlind Daku. Early in the second half, Egor Teslenko doubled his team's lead.

But the Army men were saved by Matvei Lukin - the young defender scored two goals. The first one happened in the middle of the second half. Soon Dmitri Kabutov was sent off. Even in the minority, Rashid Rakhimov's side were within half a minute of victory, but Lukin equalized seconds before the final whistle. But that draw didn't help CSKA much.

Marko Nikolic's side are firmly stuck in the middle of the table in sixth place, six points behind third place. "Rubin" remains eighth, having missed the chance to cut the gap from CSKA to two points.

- It was a shame to let the victory slip away in the final seconds. Unfortunately, we didn't hold on, and the suspension played its part," Egor Teslenko told Izvestia. - But we're happy with the quality of play in this game and in the championship as a whole. We had a good stretch in the fall. We took points from almost all the leaders and in general we show good soccer. But we always want to be as high as possible, so we will do everything to get closer to the leading group.

Also in the 17th round there were three more matches. Akron Togliatti won at home against Orenburg (1:0). "Rostov" defeated on its field "Pari Nizhny Novgorod" (4:0). Dinamo Makhachkala played a draw with Fakel Voronezh at home (0:0). The tour will end in Grozny with a match between local Akhmat and Dynamo Moscow. At the end of the next 18 rounds, the championship will go on pause until March.