Sports weekend with Izvestia

Football

A friendly match. Qatar – Russia

Our national team has started the autumn international sparring series. On Thursday evening, she held a meeting with Jordan in Moscow, and now she is going to Qatar, where she will play with the local national team. This is the second time in two years that Russia has played Qatar, one of the strongest teams in the Asian Football Confederation, and the winner of the last two championships of its continent.

September 7, 18:15, Jassim bin Hamad Al-Sadd Stadium (Riyadh, Qatar). Live broadcasts on Match TV and Match Premier

Hockey

KHL. The Opening Cup. "Locomotive" – "Tractor". The regular season. Metallurg – Ak Bars, CSKA Moscow – Dynamo, Shanghai Dragons - SKA

The new KHL season starts on Friday. Traditionally, it begins with the Opening Cup match, where the winners of the previous playoffs (winner of the Gagarin Cup) and the regular season (winner of the Continental Cup) usually meet. Since Lokomotiv Yaroslavl won both tournaments in the last draw, on September 5 it will host Traktor Chelyabinsk, the finalist of the Gagarin Cup, on its ice in the Opening Cup.

And on the weekend, a number of top matches will be held as part of the regular season. The St. Petersburg derby will be held in the Northern Capital, where SKA will play away with a new team, Shanghai Dragons, which appeared as a result of the reorganization of Kunlun Red Star, formally a Chinese club, but since 2020, due to covid, it has been holding home matches in Mytishchi. The Dragons are now playing in St. Petersburg at the world's largest arena and plan to move to Shanghai in the coming seasons.

Starting readiness: in what form are the KHL teams approaching the start of the season

Let's summarize the results of the pre-season tournaments for the top KHL clubs

Also on Saturday, two more classic confrontations will take place: the Moscow derby of CSKA and Dynamo, as well as the meeting of the two most titled clubs in Russian history — Magnitogorsk Metallurg and Kazan Ak Bars.

September 5, 19:30, Arena 2000 (Yaroslavl). September 6: 14:30, Metallurg Arena (Magnitogorsk); 16:00, CSKA Arena (Moscow); 17:00, SKA Arena (St. Petersburg). Live broadcasts on Match TV, KHL TV, KHL Prime and Kinopoisk

Football

A friendly match. Russia (U-21) – Saudi Arabia (U-23)

The Russian youth national football team also plays its friendly matches in early September. Our players under the age of 21 will host a Saudi Arabian team consisting of players under the age of 23. Both of these meetings will be held in Khimki. The first one is scheduled for Friday, September 5, and the second one for Monday, September 8.

September 5, 17:00, Rodina Stadium (Khimki). Live broadcast on Kinopoisk

A friendly match. Russia (U-17) – North Korea (U-17)

In addition to the Russian national and youth national teams, the Russian youth national team will also hold friendly matches in the coming days for players under the age of 17. Her schedule is quite exotic, as she will meet twice with her peers from the DPRK. The games will be held on September 5 and 8 in Khabarovsk. Most of our young football players are still unknown to a wide range of viewers, but among them is Vadim Shilov, who has already made his RPL debut for Zenit St. Petersburg.

September 5, 11:00 a.m., Lenin Stadium (Khabarovsk). Live broadcasts in the Russian Youth National Team group on VKontakte

Friendly match. Zenit – Sion

While there is a pause for national team games in club football, Zenit St. Petersburg is holding another status friendly match. The Swiss Sion is coming to visit him again. This team has already played in St. Petersburg in June with the blue-white-blues. And this was the first meeting of Russian clubs or national teams with a rival from Western Europe after February 2022. At that time, the leadership of Sion was severely criticized by the local media and the football community for traveling to the Northern Capital. But now the club is going to St. Petersburg again.

September 6, 19:00, Gazprom Arena (Saint Petersburg). Live broadcasts on Match TV and Match Premier

Mixed martial arts

UFC Fight Night 258. Andreas Gustaffson – Rinat Fahretdinov

A mixed martial arts tournament, UFC Fight Night 258, will be held in Paris this weekend. The attention of the Russians will be focused on the fight in the preliminary card, where our welterweight fighter Rinat Fahretdinov will face the Swede Andreas Gustaffson. The 33-year-old Russian athlete has already fought 25 professional MMA matches, of which he won 23, lost one and drew one. The upcoming fight will be his first this year.

September 6, 21:05, Accor Arena (Paris, France). Live broadcast on "Match! The fighter"