Sports weekend with Izvestia

Football

The Russian Championship. Zenit – Lokomotiv, Krasnodar – Spartak

At the end of the week, two top matches will be played in the 14th round of the RPL. On Saturday, two clubs competing for the championship will meet in St. Petersburg - local Zenit will host Moscow's Lokomotiv. The team from the Northern Capital is in fourth place, three points behind the first. The Railwaymen are two points behind the leader. Both teams need to win the next match in order to continue to closely pursue Krasnodar, which is leading the standings, and will face Spartak Moscow at home on Sunday. The red and white are sixth, are seven points from the leader and must defeat the reigning champion if they want to join the medal race.

November 1, 20:15, Gazprom Arena (Saint Petersburg). November 2, 19:30, Ozon Arena Stadium (Krasnodar). Live broadcasts on Match TV and Match Premier

Tennis

The final WTA tournament. Doubles.

The world tennis season ends in November. Most players are playing the last official tournaments this week, but the top eight in the world rankings still have Final Tournaments ahead of them. So, the Final tournament of the Women's Tennis Association (WTA) in Riyadh starts this weekend. This year, there are no Russian tennis players among the participants in singles, but if someone from the top eight is eliminated from the competition, our Mirra Andreeva will get there, who, being ninth in the ranking, went to the capital of Saudi Arabia as a reserve. It is also possible that Ekaterina Alexandrova, who completes the top ten, will be included in the tournament.

However, Andreeva will not have to sit idle in the first week of November, as she and Diana Schneider will take part in the doubles competition, which will be held on the same days. In addition to our purely Russian duo, Veronika Kudermetova will also perform — as usual, she will be paired with Belgian Alice Mertens. They got into Martina Navratilova's group, where they will compete for reaching the semifinals with Italians Sara Errani and Jasmine Paolini, Xie Shuwei from Chinese Taipei and Elena Ostapenko from Latvia, as well as American Aisha Muhammad and Dutch Demi Schurs.

Jack-of-all-trades "Masters": how Medvedev and Khachanov started in Paris

Confident victories at the start give hope for a successful performance of the Russians at the last tournament of the year

The Andreeva/Schneider pair ended up in Liesel Huber's group, where Tim Babos (Hungary) will also perform/Luisa Stefani (Brazil), Taylor Townsend (USA)/Katerina Sinyakova (Czech Republic) and Gabriela Dabrowski (Canada)/Erin Rutliff (Australia).

November 1: 15:30, Errani/Paolini – Muhammad/Schurs; 21:00, Mertens/Kudermetova – Shuway/Ostapenko. November 2: 15:00, Dabrowski/Rutliff – Andreeva/Schneider; 20:00, Townsend/Sinyakova – Babosh/Stephanie. November 3: 15:30, Shuwei/Ostapenko – Muhammad/Schurs; 21:00, Mertens/Kudermetova – Errani/Paolini. November 4: 15:00, Babosh/Stephanie – Andreeva/Schneider; 20:00, Townsend/Sinyakova – Dabrowski/Rutliff. King Saudi University Indoor Arena (Riyadh, Saudi Arabia). Live broadcasts on the WTA website

Figure skating

The Russian Grand Prix. The second stage

A new season started in Russian figure skating in October, and the second stage of the Grand Prix will be held in Krasnoyarsk next weekend. Among the most high—profile participants are the 2020 world junior champion, participant of the 2022 Beijing Olympics Andrey Mozalev (men's singles), the 2023 Russian champion Sofia Akatieva (women's singles), five-time European Championships medalists Alexandra Stepanova and Ivan Bukin (ice dancing) and European champions 2020, bronze medalists. World Cup – 2021 Alexandra Boikova and Dmitry Kozlovsky (pair skating).

November 2, short programs: 10:15, ice dancing; 12:00, women; 13:45, men; 15:30, sports pairs. November 3, free skating: 10:00 a.m., ice dancing; 11:45 a.m., women; 1:45 p.m., men; 3:45 p.m., pairs. Crystal Arena (Krasnoyarsk). Live broadcasts on Channel One and Channel One's website

Hockey

KHL Regular Season. Dynamo (Moscow) – CSKA, Salavat Yulaev – Lokomotiv, Dynamo (Minsk) – CSKA, SKA – Dynamo (Moscow)

In the first days of November, the KHL will host at least four matches with the prefix "top". CSKA Moscow will hold two away meetings with two Dynamo teams — Moscow and Minsk. The capital derby with the blue and white is a chance for the red and blue to gain a foothold in the Western Conference playoff zone, where they are in an unexpectedly low eighth place. Recently, Dynamo Moscow was there, which, after three major victories in a row, rose to sixth place and is trying to catch up with the leading group. Dinamo Minsk is in it — it is the fourth and will try to hold this position in the match with CSKA.

"It feels like a certain load has been lifted from the Locomotive"

Dynamo Moscow hockey player Artyom Sergeev talks about how the current Gagarin Cup winner has changed, the results of his team and the influence of goalkeepers on the game of the blue and white

In turn, Dynamo Moscow will also have to travel to St. Petersburg SKA, which unexpectedly found itself outside the playoff zone. The army men from the Northern Capital must definitely win in order to keep up with the top eight of the West. The leader of the conference, the current Gagarin Cup winner Lokomotiv Yaroslavl, will visit the rising Ufa Salavat Yulaev, who was in last place in the East back in mid—October, but after four consecutive wins is approaching the playoff zone.

November 1, 19:30, VTB Arena (Moscow). November 2, 2:30 p.m., Ufa Arena (Ufa). November 3, 17:00, Minsk Arena (Minsk, Belarus). November 4, 17:00, IC "Ice Palace" (St. Petersburg). Live broadcasts on Match TV, KHL TV, KHL Prime and Kinopoisk

Basketball

VTB United League. CSKA Moscow – Lokomotiv Kuban

As usual, in Russian basketball, special attention should be paid to face—to-face matches of teams from the top four of the VTB United League - CSKA Moscow, Kazan UNICS, Zenit St. Petersburg and Krasnodar Lokomotiv Kuban. For many years now, they have been fighting among themselves for leadership in the regular season, and then jointly advance to the semifinals of the playoffs, where they play for the main trophy of the tournament. On the first day of November, we will see the match between CSKA and Lokomotiv Kuban, who have already played seven matches this season. The Army team has only one defeat, and the Railwaymen have two. The upcoming game will determine who will gain a foothold in the leading positions in the coming weeks.

November 1, 19:30, Megasport Arena (Moscow). Live broadcasts on "Match! The game"