Balls are ready: how is the Russian national team preparing for the upcoming matches

The Russian national football team is facing difficult friendly meetings with Iran and Bolivia. On Tuesday, the Novogorsk Training Center hosted an open training session and briefings with the participation of players and coaching staff. About who will enter the field and how Valery Karpin evaluates the upcoming opponents, see the Izvestia article.

Composition selection

The day before, it became clear that due to injuries, three players who were included in the final squad would not be able to help the national team. We are talking about midfielders Daniil Fomin and Ruslan Litvinov, as well as striker Tamerlan Musaev.

The CSKA forward was injured during Sunday's Moscow derby against Spartak (3-2) in the 11th round of the Russian Championship. His absence led to a paradoxical situation. After he dropped out, the coaching staff did not call anyone to replace him and there were only two strikers left in the national team — Dmitry Vorobyov and Ivan Sergeev. As a result, there were fewer forwards than goalkeepers — there are now four of them in the national team. After training, the head coach of the Russian national team, Valery Karpin, explained to reporters why strikers Alexander Sobolev and Nikolai Komlichenko were not called up.

"There are no headaches due to the attackers yet, although there is a shortage of them,— Karpin said. — There is Vorobyov, Sergeev. Sobolev is not convincing yet. Komlichenko is still losing the competition (to Vorobyov at Lokomotiv. — Izvestia).

The main event was the appearance of Spartak midfielder Nail Umyarov in the final list of the national team. At each training camp, there were questions from journalists about the non-recall of the red and white football player. And the answer always came that there were stronger players in his position.

Even Artyom Dzyuba and Maxim Glushenkov had to wait less for an invitation to the national team from Karpin, although the former had a long-term personal conflict with Valery Georgievich, and the latter seemed to close his way to the national team after a high-profile interview in September 2024, when he said that he would rather train with the Brazilians at Zenit than go. to the national team.

Umyarov had no disagreements with the coach, but his absence from the lists for previous training camps gave rise to theories that he would never get a call under Karpin. As a result, the call occurred in October.

"That's why I'm calling them, so you don't have to ask," Karpin joked. — I called Umyarov so that you wouldn't ask. Couldn't stand the pressure. I deserved it, so I called it out. Because of the journalists, too.

Matvey Safonov, who came from French PSG, Stanislav Agkatsev, a representative of Krasnodar, Denis Adamov, goalkeeper of Zenit St. Petersburg, and Alexander Maksimenko from Spartak Moscow were called up to the goalkeeper team. The controversy was caused by the inclusion of Maksimenko, who has not been playing very consistently for the club lately. But the goalkeeper coach of the Russian national team, Vitaly Kafanov, does not agree with Spartak's criticism.

— According to Maksimenko, at that time they were thinking whether to call or not. Spartak is playing just ugly in defense,— Kafanov said. — He became the best player of the match and cleared all the questions. There are no errors. It doesn't help, yes. But the team is not losing points because of him. Everything else goes to the Spartak coaching staff.

At the same time, the goalkeeper of the Moscow "Locomotive" Anton Mitryushkin, whose team is in second place in the Russian championship, was not called up to the national team. And this is largely due to his goalkeeper, who made some fantastic saves in the last match against Dynamo Moscow (5-3). Spartak and Maksimenko, in turn, are now sixth in the RPL.

— We are not looking at the place in the table, but at the quality of the goalkeeper's game, — Kafanov explained. — Apart from one mistake, Maksimenko has been doing everything right during this period. Spartak concedes a lot, but there are complaints about the goalkeepers. No need to look at the missed count. Mitryushkin and Maksimenko are in the same situation.

Rivals

Midfielder Alexei Miranchuk, who plays for Atlanta United in the North American MLS League, was absent from the Russian national team's training session on Tuesday. He has not yet flown to Moscow from the United States and is scheduled to join the national team on Wednesday. The rest of the players remaining in the application were in place. Only the captain of Rostov, midfielder Konstantin Kuchaev, trained in a limited mode.

Our team is scheduled to fly to Volgograd on Thursday, where they will play Iran on Friday, October 10. This will be the third visit of the Russian national team to the city on the Volga in the last two years. In November 2022, she played Cuba there, defeating it with a score of 8:0. A year later, Valery Karpin's team met Syria in Volgograd. And we also won big (5-0).

Iran will be the most high-profile rival that the local public has seen in recent history. The attendance was high the last two times — more than 40 thousand people at the game against Cuba and more than 35 thousand at the match against Syria. The maximum interest of the audience is expected now.

—Volgograd is very comfortable,— Karpin said. — Not only there, but also in Krasnodar. People there are not spoiled by football, as in Moscow. Personally, I would love to play in Rostov-on-Don, but due to logistics, it's unlikely.

The second match against Bolivia will take place four days later, on October 14 in Moscow at the VTB Arena stadium. Representatives of the national team highly rate both rivals.

— We can say that Iran and Bolivia, plus or minus, are the same in strength, they differ in style. Bolivia is more technical, Iran is more athletic,— Karpin explained.

Both matches — against Iran and Bolivia — will begin at 20:00 Moscow time. Recall that, in addition to these meetings, Russia will have two more home games before the end of the year. On November 12, our team will host the national team of Peru in St. Petersburg, and three days later they will play against Chile in Sochi.