"Debts in Rostov are not the same as before, not for four months"

The Rostov Football Club has recently undergone drastic changes. At the beginning of 2025, head coach Valery Karpin and long-time captain Danil Glebov left him. Under the leadership of Jonathan Alba, the yellow and blue reached the final of the Russian Cup. Before the first full season under the Spaniard, two more iconic players left the Don team — Nikolay Komlichenko and Maxim Osipenko. And in the fall, the long-term president of Rostov, Artashes Harutyunyants, left.

There are always rumors about the club's big financial problems. Nevertheless, Alba's players are confidently in tenth place in the Russian championship and have a good chance of staying in the RPL for next season four rounds before the end. The gap from the transition zone is four points, from the relegation zone — five. This week, Rostov played a 1-1 draw with CSKA Moscow. In an interview with Izvestia, Donetsk midfielder Kirill Shchetinin assessed the team's results, spoke about the financial situation, spoke about the rumors surrounding the club and shared his expectations from the finish of the championship.

"I'm confident in everyone I play with, and in myself"

— How did you achieve an away draw with CSKA?

— We were good in the first half, CSKA — in the second. It seems to me that the result is logical, according to the game. It seemed to me that if we had played the whole match like in the first half, we could have won.

— What prevents Rostov from playing more often this spring, as in the first half against CSKA?

— We either play well in the first half or in the second. I do not know how it happens. As for the first half against CSKA, we had good pressure. And in the second half it didn't work out. That's why our match turned out the way it did.

— How comfortable can Rostov feel in the remaining four rounds from the point of view of maintaining registration in the RPL for the next season?

— We are not in the docking zone. Why should we care?

— Is the current four-point gap from the joint zone enough not to worry? After all, in previous seasons, you secured your place in the RPL much earlier.

— This season we have given away quite a lot of games in the end, in the last minutes. Something wasn't working out. But personally, I am confident in everyone I play with, and in myself personally, that we will be able to cope with this difficult situation.

— But why didn't you manage to solve all your problems earlier this time?

— There are just games when you play well, but you don't hit the opponent's goal. And sometimes you play badly, but everything gets knocked up. I can't explain to you how it works. Everyone has bad matches. Even the top players of world football. It can't be explained. Sometimes there is a recession, sometimes there is none. Take the same CSKA. Is he in a slump right now? There is. Is Lokomotiv in decline? There is.

And there's no way to explain it. Any self-respecting football player wants to win. Not even a draw, but a win. Sometimes it doesn't work out. It happens that the opponent plays well. The opponent can't just stand on the field while we play.

— In which matches did you lose points this season?

— There was a good match with Lokomotiv when we played 3:3. We conceded in the end, but it's good that we equalized in the end. We recently lost offensively against Sochi, conceding at the end (0:1). We could have won the recent match with Spartak (1-1) when Anton Shamonin did not make a one-on-one exit.

— Was there any support for him after that episode?

— Of course, they supported me. He's a young player. It happens to everyone. Scored a goal — a hero. If you don't score, what will you do now? I repeat, this happens to everyone. The main thing is not to get upset and keep working.

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"Most of what they write about us is not true"

— Over the past 10 years, Rostov has been constantly at the epicenter of news about financial problems, especially after the change of managers. How are things going now? Do you have salary debts to the players?

— Not like before. Not four months.

—How much?"

"I can't tell you.

"Less than two months?"

- of course. It's just that, as far as we can tell from the communication with the CEO of the club, the management finds sponsors, so it will be better from now on. When it will be and what — these are no longer questions for me.

— Will it be considered a success if you stay in the RPL without any problems, taking into account all the changes that have taken place in the last year and a half — the departure of key players, the long-term head coach and the president of the club?

— No, it won't be a success. You have given a situation that you have imagined for yourself.

— But the key people of Rostov in recent years have really left the club.

— Everyone said about us that Glebov's departure would break the club, then Karpin's departure would break, then the departure of the rest of the players and managers. But after Glebov and Karpin left, we played in the Russian Cup final. And we didn't care about the losses. It's what they write... You know, you journalists love all this stuff. But most of what they write about us is not true. I don't know who's writing this or where he's getting it from.

— What exactly do you mean? Are you talking about the rumors about the pre-bankruptcy status of the club?

— Not only that. How can we say that we don't have the money to travel to Nizhny Novgorod when everything has already been paid for?

— I didn't write it, the question is not for me.

— I'm not talking about you. I'm just saying that some journalists write such things. Another person writes that 3 thousand rubles is not enough for an MRI scan. When did an MRI scan cost 3,000 rubles? Never. And we fly to away matches, as expected. We flew to Moscow for the match with CSKA. We didn't come to them on horseback.