"Mali's lack of fundamentals doesn't mean they can't play"

The Russian national football team played its first friendly matches in March in 2026. At first, in Krasnodar, Valery Karpin's team had a hard time beating Nicaragua (3:1). And then in St. Petersburg we played a draw with not the strongest team of Mali (0:0). In the first meeting, defender of Kaliningrad "Baltika" Mingiyan Beveev spent the entire 90 minutes on the field, in the second he came on as a substitute in the middle of the second half. In an interview with Izvestia, the 30-year-old football player appreciated these matches, explained why Mali should be taken seriously even without leaders, and also spoke about Baltika's chances of winning medals at the Russian championship and how the team would act without the disqualified head coach Andrei Talalaev.

— Why couldn't Mali be defeated?

— It's hard to say... the coaching staff will tell us what we did wrong. But I think the key here is that we didn't score goals in the moments we had. We had some good moments. Unfortunately, we were unable to implement them. And in the second half, they tried to attack even more, so they started to open up in their own half of the field. Hence, the opponent began to create a sharpness at our gate. But we still had more opportunities to score goals. And it was necessary to use them.

— Was there an underestimation of the opponent, given that he did not come with the main squad?

— And what kind of underestimation can there be? The team is constantly playing official matches — for that alone, it must be taken as seriously as possible.

— After all, we didn't have six or seven basic players in St. Petersburg. A lot of young people came out as part of them.

—So what now?" Is that why they can't play football? No, of course not. This is a good team that cannot be underestimated. And we took it seriously.

— Is there negativity and panic from such results of recent matches — a squeaky win over Nicaragua and a draw with Mali?

— Probably, this all means that there is even more work ahead. So in general, we should not panic. It seems to me that some details of the results of these matches need to be sorted out and adjusted. And keep working. Good teams played against us. It was a difficult game for Nicaragua, too: this opponent came out to fight us, put a lot of pressure on us. And he showed that he did not come to us to lose easily. In general, there is a lot that needs to be analyzed and conclusions drawn.

— In March, Maxim Petrov, your partner at Baltika, received his first call-up to the national team and made his debut for it in the match against Nicaragua. How did he adapt to this?

— I think I've adapted well. Max is a very ambitious guy, he always plays with maximum dedication. Everyone saw it in the matches for Baltika. He went to the national team with the same attitude. In general, both I and the other guys in the national team tried to help him adapt, but since he had already played for the youth national team, he had no particular problems with this.

— You made your debut for the national team in the autumn and since then you have played six matches in a row against different opponents, either in the starting line—up or coming on as a substitute. How did you manage to gain the trust of Valery Karpin?

— It's hard to say… This is a question for Valery Georgievich. I always come to the national team with great pleasure. What I can do, I do. I try to be helpful when I'm called.

— You have become especially famous at Baltika this season because of how far and accurately you throw balls out of the box into someone else's penalty area, resulting in goals or scoring chances. Did the national team try to play something like this in training?

— There were some such moments in Krasnodar when we played against Nicaragua. I thought that there would be such an opportunity with Mali when I came on as a substitute. But it didn't work out. Perhaps because the opponent's defenders are very tall. It would have been hard for the guys to beat them in the penalty area when I was thrown out. Therefore, it was pointless to throw balls there just like that.

— Is a week or so of training in the national team enough to play such combinations?

"Quite enough." You just need to be clear about where you're going to throw, at what point, and whether our guys will have the opportunity to win the fight for the ball there.

— The last segment remains in the Russian championship. Do you believe that Baltika is capable of finishing it in the top three?

— There are eight rounds left until the end of the season, which is the decisive part of the championship. I think everything is in our hands. Moreover, the gap from the third place is only two points. So anything is possible.

— Will it be difficult for you without Andrei Talalaev, who still has three more games of suspension left due to the brawl incident at the end of the meeting with CSKA (1-0)?

— I think he will still give us tips between games. As it is, we have already adjusted our actions on the field during the season, and this should help during matches. A lot will depend on Andrey Viktorovich [Talalaev]'s assistants, they are doing their job well. And we did well during the last matches when the head coach was absent due to suspension.

— It was your first time playing for the national team with Matvey Safonov as PSG's main goalkeeper. Has he somehow changed his game plan after getting an internship at the highest European level?

"I wouldn't say that. Matvey was a great goalkeeper, and he still is. I wouldn't say that he didn't do well in the national team when he was in the reserves at PSG. But, of course, playing for a club all the time, especially such a strong one, is always beneficial. Therefore, I am happy for him and hope that he will continue to perform with the same confidence.