Southern appearance: the Russian national team has decided on the opponents for May and June

The Russian national football team has decided on the opponents for the upcoming friendly matches. At the end of May, Valery Karpin's team will play away against Egypt, and in early June they will play home matches with Burkina Faso and Trinidad and Tobago.

Egypt is the main rival

Egypt, which Russia will face in Cairo, will become one of the strongest rivals of the national team during the suspension from official tournaments. The national team is currently ranked 29th in the FIFA rankings. Of all the teams that the Russians have played with since 2022, only Iran and Nigeria are above the Egyptians.

The Russian national team itself is in the 36th position in the ranking. Egypt remains one of the most decorated national teams in African football: it has won the Africa Cup of Nations more often than others — seven times. The closest pursuer, Cameroon, has won this tournament five times. The Egyptians won the last title in 2010, but in later years the team maintained a high level: in 2021, it became the silver medalist of the continental championship.

At the same time, Egypt did not perform very successfully at the World Championships. The team reached the final stage of the tournament only three times (in 1934, 1990 and 2018) and failed to overcome the group stage each time. At the World Cup, the Egyptians played in the same group with Russia and lost to it with a score of 1:3. And now Egypt has entered the fourth World Cup in its history, which will be held this year in the USA, Canada and Mexico.

Most of the Egyptian national team's players compete in the national championship, but there are also players representing European clubs. The main star of the team remains striker Mohamed Salah, the champion of England and the winner of the 2019 Champions League with Liverpool. The striker's future at the English club remains a subject of discussion in the media, so his participation in the match against Russia is not yet guaranteed.

Whether Salah will play is one of the main intrigues of the upcoming match, as recently some strong national teams have not always brought optimal squads to meetings with the Russians. So, Valery Karpin's team played the previous match at home against Mali, which arrived without several leading players.

— A lot will depend on whether Egypt will play against us with its strongest squad, but in any case, it's good that Russia will have such a strong national team among its rivals, — Dmitry Bulykin, a former striker of the Russian national team, shared his opinion with Izvestia. — The RFU has picked up some good opponents against whom you can check your current status.

The match against Egypt will take place on May 28 in Cairo.

Russian national team home matches

Burkina Faso is ranked 62nd in the FIFA rankings. She has never qualified for the World Championships, and in the African Cup of Nations, the highest achievement is third place in 2017. At the same time, Burkina Faso has consistently reached the playoffs at the last three continental tournaments - in 2023 and 2025 it reached the 1/8 finals, and in 2021 it reached the semifinals and became the fourth.

She has a lot of players playing in the top European championships (England, France, Germany), as well as one legionnaire from Russia, Akhmat Grozny striker Mohamed Konate.

Trinidad and Tobago is ranked 102nd in the FIFA rankings and is one of the strongest teams in the Caribbean. However, against the background of rivals from North and Central America, she is not so good and has never achieved success in the continental championship.

The Trinidad and Tobago national team entered the World Cup once, in 2006. There she became the last in her group. The current squad includes several high-quality players from European championships, as well as Spartak Moscow striker Levi Garcia.

"Apart from Egypt, Russia's rivals are not the strongest, but they should not be belittled," Vyacheslav Koloskov, honorary president of the Russian Football Federation, told Izvestia. — We already had stories in the last two years when we played against very weak teams like Brunei (11:0) and Grenada (5:0). Immediately, against the background of Burkina Faso and Trinidad and Tobago, you can test yourself, see how ready Russian players are for international matches against the background of the fact that for four years they have been able to show themselves outside the RPL only for the national team. At the same time, in March, we saw how difficult our meetings with Nicaragua (3-1) and Mali (0-0) were. Therefore, we need to play with those countries with which the RFU can come to an agreement.

The match with Burkina Faso will be held on June 5 in Volgograd, with Trinidad and Tobago on June 9 in Kaliningrad.