Army readiness: CSKA wins the RPL Winter Cup

One of the main exhibition tournaments of the winter preparatory period for RPL clubs has ended in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). According to the results of the Winter Cup, CSKA Moscow took the first place. At the last moment, this trophy went to the army team from Krasnodar, who lost in the final minutes to Dynamo Moscow (0:1). However, participants and experts agree that the key objective of the tournament was to check the readiness of the top clubs before the season resumed. Some are more involved in the integration of newcomers, like Zenit St. Petersburg, which became the last to make two powerful transfers recently.

Tournament

February 10 was the last game day of the Winter Cup. In the morning, CSKA met with Zenit. The match ended in a draw in regular time. The Army team took the lead twice at the beginning of both halves — Kirill Glebov and Joao Victor scored. But the blue-white-blues were compared in the endings, thanks to the goals of Wendell and Douglas Santos.

CSKA won in the penalty shootout (4:3). It is worth noting that Fabio Celestini's team reached the post-match series in all three of their matches during the tournament. First, Krasnodar was beaten (2:2 in regular time, 5:4 on penalties), then there was a defeat from Dynamo (1:1, 3:4 on penalties). In such cases, according to the rules, two points are given for a win and one for a loss.

Thus, the army team scored a total of five points. Krasnodar followed with four points, having played against Dynamo in the evening and having a chance to finish first in case of a victory. But in the end, the Bulls conceded in the last minutes from Dynamo's El-Mehdi Mauhub.

Earlier, in addition to winning on penalties at CSKA, Dynamo also lost in regular time to Zenit (1:2), which, in turn, lost to the Army on penalties and was defeated by Krasnodar (0:3). As a result, two Moscow clubs scored five points each, while their competitors scored four points each.

— A good combat tournament was held with the participation of four top clubs who played quite well for this stage of preparation, - Andrey Chervichenko, the former owner of Spartak, shared his opinion with Izvestia. — Most of the players have not completely gotten out from under the strain yet, the coaches are widely shuffling the lineups and introducing newcomers, so it's difficult to expect any high speeds and meaningful actions. CSKA won this tournament largely due to luck, as they won in two of three penalty shootouts and simply made fewer mistakes than their opponents. Whereas Krasnodar missed the match with Dynamo at the end, because it was exhausted — this will not happen to it in the official games in the spring, the physical readiness will be different. So everyone has checked themselves and in the remaining three weeks before the resumption of the season they will correct the shortcomings, and at the same time they will improve their physical fitness.

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Trains

In January, CSKA made two high—profile transfers from the camp of competitors - midfielder and captain of Moscow "Locomotive" Dmitry Barinov and striker of St. Petersburg "Zenit" Luciano Gonda. Apart from missing the last match with Dynamo, both entered the RPL Winter Cup games from the first minute and left the field in the middle of the second half.

Gondu scored a goal against Krasnodar. They expect him to solve the problem with the attack, which greatly limited the possibilities of the army in the first part of the season. Meanwhile, the club will soon sign a contract with the talented young Krasnodar midfielder Danila Kozlov, who has not made it to the base for a year and a half in the ranks of the southern team.

Central defender Igor Diveev, who was traded from CSKA to Gonda, is already playing hard for Zenit. In the match with Krasnodar at the Winter Cup, the Brazilian star John-John, signed at the end of January, made his debut for St. Petersburg. He scored an assist. The day before the last meeting, the Colombian star striker John Duran, who played in the Middle East in the same team with Cristiano Ronaldo, was leased from Saudi Al-Nasr. In the last six months, he has been on loan at Fenerbahce in Turkey.

"Transfers are very high—level, but it is not yet clear how the players will fit into Zenit," Sergei Silkin, former Dynamo head coach, told Izvestia. — In any case, there is still time to play them in the squad, although the Army team has a more convenient situation, since they signed Barinov and Gonda before the first training camp. Now it is important how Dynamo and Krasnodar will strengthen. Ricardo has been with the former since January, but he has not started playing yet. As for Krasnodar, they have a strong squad as it is, but it would not hurt to strengthen the bench.

The Russian Championship will resume on February 27. So far, after 18 rounds, the reigning champion Krasnodar is in the lead, one point ahead of Zenit, three ahead of Lokomotiv and four ahead of CSKA. Dynamo remains on the 10th line. There are 12 rounds left before the finish.