Come in Spanish: how Spartak beat Loko, and Cordoba scored the most important goal

In the central match of the next round of the RPL, Spartak beat Lokomotiv on its own field (2:1), winning for the fourth time in five matches after the winter break and remaining in sixth place in the RPL. Loko continues to occupy the third place, but the red-green gap between Krasnodar and Zenit is already decent — seven and eight points, respectively. Murad Musaev's team put the squeeze on Akhmat (1-0), and Sergei Semak's team left no chance for Krylia Sovetov (2-0).

Fatal foul

The first half of the Moscow derby was left to Mikhail Galaktionov's team, which had an impressive creative stretch. Bakayev's first shot forced Maksimenko to turn the ball to the corner, and Montes opened the scoring after Batrakov's standard. I was struck by how easily the Mexican, who was running from the depths, got away from Jiku. The Railwaymen took the initiative and could have built on their success, but Prutsev, attacking from the center of the penalty area after throwing in an out and Fasson's rebate, could not set Maksimenko unsolvable tasks.

Ugalde's substitution was a key factor for the hosts. The Costa Rican did noticeably more in a few minutes than Garcia. Manfred got a good grip on the ball and assisted Denisov, who was attacking in the fall. Then he hit himself, and finally, after Jiku's attempt to score through himself, he earned a penalty.

Ugalde hit his head in the fall, and Morozov's hand was in the way of the ball. There were no questions about the 11-meter shot initially, but the Loko defender, who had a yellow card, avoided additional sanctions. As it turned out, not for long. Evgeny still got the second "mustard plaster" by dumping Ugalde on the lawn. Outnumbered, the guests stopped keeping up with their opponents. In the decisive attack, Silyanov and Fasson, who cut off the team with an unsuccessful pass to the flank, did not finalize, who did not calculate the trajectory of Zobnin's feed, after which Solari perfectly shot his head in the opposite direction to the goalkeeper.

If after the victory in Orenburg they said that Spartak gave the most complete game under Carcedo, now it turned out to be the Spaniard's absolutely best half in the RPL. And Denisov, who did not score in someone else's goal, saved his own by securing Maksimenko and preventing Montes from scoring a double. The red-and-whites are only three points behind the Krasnodar and Zenit Railwaymen.

A special moment

Vladimir Moskalev became the first referee in the RPL to apply the "eight-second rule": he recorded that Akron goalkeeper Ignat Terekhovsky did not put the ball into play for more than the allotted time, specifically 12 seconds, blew the whistle and awarded a corner. By an interesting coincidence, this was the harbinger of the first goal in the match — and the first goal for CSKA Luciano Gonda.

Now this will be expected from everyone and always in such situations. Referees, goalkeepers, and coaches should be aware of this. From now on, the absence of such decisions will be considered a judicial error. But commentator Timur Zhuravel also asked the right question: would the same Moskalev have risked sending the ball from the goalkeeper's hands to the corner like that if it had not been young Terekhovsky, but a figure of such a powerful and fair authority as Igor Akinfeev? After all, the law should be the same for everyone.

Moreover, this rhetorical question was asked long before the referee canceled the second goal of Akron due to a rather controversial foul by Artem Dzyuba on the goalkeeper of the red and blue, which caused a lot of discussion. So, even ex-Army soldier Alexander Grishin said on TV that the goal was clean.

After a rather radical change in the starting line-up of CSKA, back in the last round, against the same Makhachkala, which left only one Brazilian Enrique Carmo in the red and blue from the first minutes (the same thing happened now), Fabio Celestini's team won two victories in a row. But if the army team won with a clear advantage before the break for the national teams, now the game was, as they say, three-way.

And from what was happening on the field, even Akron's victory looked more natural than CSKA's three points. The same Akinfeev saved his team with another save after going one-on-one, which looked extremely unconvincing in the second half. The outcome of the match was decided by a stunningly beautiful long-range shot by Danil Krugovoy at the end of the match.

Spring of Sobolev

Krylia Sovetov, judging by everything that is happening there, seems to be the main contender for being sent along with Sochi to the "best league in the world." And Magomed Adiev's dismissal, coupled with the appointment of Sergei Bulatov a couple of days before the tour — although the club had two weeks at its disposal during the national team break — says the same thing.

But in the first half, a goalless draw ended in St. Petersburg. Zenit has a lot of approaches, but very few scoring chances. And it was no coincidence that it was 1-1 in shots on target by halftime. In the second half, the hosts improved. John John opened the scoring early in the second half with a double bounce. This could be considered a coincidence, but right before that, Alexander Sobolev had to close Maxim Glushenkov's shot. And soon the same Sobolev proved that now it's just some kind of his spring. Only John Cordoba, who had yet to score on that day, scored more in the RPL in 2026.

The next two matches — for the Cup with Spartak, the former Sobolev club, and in the championship with Krasnodar — will become even more significant in this regard. The meeting with Samara was more about getting the victory at the lowest possible cost, which was confirmed by the substitution at 2-0, when Sergei Semak removed Wilmar Barrios from the game, who was "hanging" in front of the bulls on the cards. And it seemed like a reasonable decision.

Six goals in Moscow

Konstantin Tyukavin, a 23-year-old blue and white forward, scored a double against Orenburg and beat Kevin Kuranyi with 57 goals, becoming Dynamo's best sniper in the 21st century. A powerful achievement for a young striker.

But Dynamo will have no more reason to be happy after the game. After all, if the game was "one-wicket" before the break, Orenburg, then Fahd Mufi's goal at 0:2 into the near nine just before the break turned everything around.

The Moroccan fullback, trying to wash away the blame for his own goal that opened the scoring in the match, developed an extremely violent activity. In the second half, he first gave a pre-goal pass to Gideon Gusina, who shot at Du Queiroz, and at 2:3 he personally addressed the assist to the same ex-Zenit player. The North African was just everywhere!

And it is worth noting the excellent match management on the part of the head coach of Orenburg, Ildar Akhmetzyanov, who released the nominal defender Du Queiroz to the position of "ten" during the break, and he made a double. Anyway, football in the second half was not like what happened before the break, and the ability to turn the tide of the game like that does Akhmetzyanov credit.

A championship victory

The match in Grozny was expected with special interest. The guests are leaders both in the table and in the game, and in terms of progress after the winter training camp, the team from Chechnya looks like one of the best in the RPL: the most experienced Stanislav Cherchesov worked very effectively. The match could have been even more meaningful if it hadn't been the first round after the national team break (many players returned from the national teams a couple of days before).

What surprised Krasnodar was that Eduard Spertsyan, who was publicly sent to the infirmary for two weeks by the head coach of the Armenian national team, came out from the first minutes. After this statement, everyone discussed whether the captain of the bulls would be able to recover in time for Zenit next weekend, but no one even mentioned his appearance with Akhmat. And he appeared not just on the field, but at the base! However, he was a pale shadow of himself, and after an hour of playing, he was replaced.

The guests generally had personnel problems — Douglas Augusto, who was disqualified, was absent and Victor Sa, who was out due to injury, they say, until the end of the season. Giovanni Gonzalez did not play particularly well in his position, and Augusto's position was taken, surprisingly, by Alexander Chernikov, who was not at home during the break for the national teams, but Kevin Lenini, who traveled all the way to New Zealand as part of the Cape Verdean national team.

As a result, everyone saw very dense, tough, organized and disciplined football in Grozny. There were no gaps between the lines at all, which prevented the teams from creating many scoring chances. And when they appear, they need to be used, which Nikita Krivtsov did not do in the first half, after Lucas Olasa gnawed the ball at the front line.

Krasnodar was lucky with Akhmat's ball, which was canceled due to a tiny offside (or another feature of drawing Chinese offside lines), while the guests themselves prevented a goalless draw in the 86th minute through the efforts of the best sniper of the championship, John Cordoba. And what a beautiful shot the Colombian got!

And notice: Cordoba scored it after arriving from the national team, and not from anywhere, but from the USA, at the very end of the game. It is through such hard victories, through torment and overwork, that gold is forged.