"I go to Lugansk every vacation, it's quiet there"

Kaliningrad "Baltika" has become the main sensation of the current season in Russian football. It was only after returning to the RPL from the First League that Andrei Talalaev's team immediately began to take points from the favorites and consistently beat the teams from the middle and bottom of the table. This allows them to take fifth place in the Russian championship after 19 rounds, eight points behind the leading Krasnodar and five points behind the third-placed Moscow Lokomotiv.

After the winter break, Baltika played Zenit St. Petersburg twice — away in the championship and at home in the Russian Cup — both times losing 0:1. But the minimum score and equal play made it clear that the Kaliningraders intend to fight for high places in the spring. One of the openings of the season in the club was defender Ivan Belikov. In an interview with Izvestia, he assessed the team's performance during the season, told who came up with the unusual outs in Baltika, and commented on Zarya's bid from his native Lugansk to the Second League of the Russian Championship.

— Can we say that during the winter break, Baltika has maintained the level of play that it showed in the first part of the season?

— Of course, we haven't sunk. I think the quality of the game has even increased. Playing against a team with a budget many times bigger than ours is always difficult. We take our toll with discipline and teamwork. Everything can be on the pitch. The quality of Baltika's game remained at a very good level. We will show it in the next matches.

— What are the tasks for the spring in the championship?

— We always have maximum tasks. We move from game to game and do not look at the table.

— Do you believe that you can finish the championship in the top three and win RPL medals?

- of course.

— In winter, you had your first long training camp at Talalaev. Were they very tough?

— Yes, they are tough. But that's probably the only way to get results.

— What was the toughest part?

— It depends on what kind of load to take. When we first arrived at the first training camp, we practiced for the first three to five days and then did the exercise when we ran and saw who could stand it. The distance increases each time, but the time remains the same. Until you fall. Something was wrong with all people - either their legs were clogging up or their breathing was getting out of control. And so we checked who was physically ready.

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— One of the main features of the current "Baltic" is the long—range ball ejections from outs performed by Mingiyan Beveyev, one of which in the fall led to your goal discount on Nikola Titkov and a goal against Spartak (1-0). In January, in an interview with Izvestia, Mingiyan highlighted your anthropometric data as one of the success factors of such practical jokes. Will it continue to work in the spring?

— Of course, he will continue. Look at how many dangerous chances there were in the match against Zenit from such outs. Yes, they didn't score any goals, but it was very dangerous.

— How many outs do you practice these draws?

— Once or twice in training before the game. Everyone knows their tasks and how to accomplish them. We've been doing this for a long time.

— Before Beveyev, Rory Delap, who played in the English Premier League (Premier League) for Stoke City, was famous for such outbursts, then Ilya Samoshnikov was fond of this business a couple of years ago, playing for Lokomotiv. Did Baltika somehow study this experience, or was everything invented from scratch?

— This is the invention of our standards coach Anver Koneev. To be honest, I don't know who exactly came up with this idea in the first place. But, probably, we watched some Premier League and Championship games, I don't know. Something was taken from them, some details. We tried it with us, and it gave some results. It could have worked against Zenit, too, but it almost didn't work out.

— You were born and raised in Lugansk. It was recently announced that the local club Zarya has entered the Division B competition of the Second League of the Russian Championship. How would you rate the team's prospects?

— Good prospects. There are very good fans there, they love football. I am familiar with almost the entire team that is currently gathered at Zara. I will root for her, I will support her in any way I can. I think they will succeed, and they will be able to create a combat-ready team that will improve step by step.

— Do you believe that the situation in the LPR will soon allow Zara to play home matches in Lugansk, and not in the Rostov region, as it is now?

"I do not know that. But everything is quiet there. I go there every vacation. Sometimes for a week, sometimes for two, but I always go there. I think there's a good future there.