Zenit without glory: how CSKA knocked the St. Petersburg club out of the Russian Cup

The first participant of the Superfinal was determined in the Russian Football Cup. They became CSKA Moscow, which won 2-0 in regular time against Zenit St. Petersburg in the second leg of the final of the RPL Path, after recovering from a defeat with a similar score in the first match, and then prevailed in a penalty shootout (4:3). Now the red and blue will compete for the trophy in the decisive match with Spartak Moscow or Rostov — they will play each other on the evening of May 15 in the final of the Path of the Regions.

As expected, the home stadium of CSKA "VEB Arena" gathered almost full stands. The army is successfully holding this spring. So far, they have lost only one official match — it was just a cup trip to Zenit. Otherwise, the red and blue either win or draw, which allowed them to rise from sixth place to third in the championship.

Now, two rounds before the finish of the national championship, Marko Nikolic's wards have even theoretical chances to beat the leading Krasnodar and Zenit, but they are six and five points behind them. For gold, the Army team needs to win the remaining two meetings against Moscow's Lokomotiv and Pari Nizhny Novgorod, as well as defeats against the Bulls and St. Petersburg in the remaining rounds, which is almost impossible.

Therefore, the Cup is a good chance for CSKA to make the season super successful. And to partially justify last year's change of head coach — in June, Marko Nikolic replaced Vladimir Fedotov. It was Fedotov who won the Russian Cup for the Army in 2023, the first in 10 years. At the same time, the club won the silver medal of the Russian championship, being among the winners of the RPL for the first time in five years.

A year later, CSKA became only the sixth in the championship, and was eliminated from the Cup at the penultimate stage, in the final of the "RPL Way". And also from Zenit. Then after a draw in two matches (1:1; 0:0) the St. Petersburg club was stronger in the penalty shootout (5:4).

Now, under Nikolic, CSKA is close to surpassing last season's result in the championship, but it is unlikely to reach the success of Fedotov's first season. And to fully justify last year's castling, it would not be superfluous for him to take the Cup.

Army selection: how Krasnodar was left without the right to make mistakes

In the remaining two rounds, Musayev's team needs to win two, Zenit is very close.

The situation became more complicated due to the away defeat in the first match (0:2). For Zenit, success in the Russian Cup was also extremely necessary, as the team faces being without gold in the championship for the first time in seven years. Once again, as for the first match, the head coach of St. Petersburg, Sergey Semak, conducted a partial rotation of the squad. So, Nuraly Alip, who rarely starts this spring, turned out to be on the defensive. And Denis Adamov came out at the gate instead of Evgeny Latyshon.

CSKA had a territorial advantage for almost the entire match, but for a long time could not translate it into goals. Nevertheless, in the 39th minute, Matvey Kislyak beautifully threw the ball from the penalty area line behind Adamov, who had gone far out of the goal, and opened the scoring.

And just before the break in the match, Zenit almost found itself in a very difficult situation. After a shot by Willian Rocha, the ball hit Alip's hand in the visitors' penalty area. The referee awarded a penalty, but Adamov beat off Ivan Oblyakov's shot.

This allowed Zenit to continue playing to hold the score in the second half. Saul Guarirapa could have scored 25 minutes before the end of regular time, but Adamov saved his team again. At the same time, the St. Petersburg club could compare twice — Matteo Casierra had a particularly good moment in the end, but after his shot, Rocha knocked the ball out of the empty net. He left CSKA in the game, and the hosts took advantage of the chance at the very end — Danil Krugovoy scored from the corner, and Tamerlan Musaev won the riding battle and scored.

It came to a penalty shootout, in which Vladislav Torop, the goalkeeper of the army team, immediately caught the ball after Alexander Sobolev's shot. After that, everyone scored until the last fifth shot of Zenit, when Gustavo Mantuan shot past the goal.

The Spartak–Rostov match in the final of the Path of the Regions will begin on Thursday at 20:00. The superfinal will be held in Moscow at the Luzhniki Stadium on June 1.