Activated Ugalde: Spartak started the Cup with a big victory

On August 4 and 5, RPL clubs joined the fight for the Russian Cup. Spartak Moscow performed most spectacularly, defeating Orenburg 5-1 in the first round of the group stage, with Manfred Ugalde scoring two goals. In the Moscow derby, Lokomotiv managed to avoid defeat from CSKA in regular time in the last minutes (1:1), but lost on penalties (4:5). The confrontation between Krasnodar and Akhmat ended with exactly the same score in the main time and in the post—match series, in favor of the Kuban club. Of the unexpected results, it is worth highlighting the defeat of Rubin Kazan by the Moscow Rodina (5:0).

Spartak — Orenburg

After two victories at the start of the Russian championship over Rodina Moscow (3:0) and Akhmat Grozny (2:1), Spartak began its performance in the Cup with a home meeting with Orenburg. This club was noted in the championship with a strong-willed victory over Rostov (2:1) and an insulting crushing defeat against Zenit St. Petersburg (0:3), where it played not much worse than the reigning champion, but did not realize its moments.

As expected, both teams thoroughly shuffled their squads for the cup meeting. And the higher class of players in Spartak's immediate reserve took its toll. However, only by the middle of the first half. Before that, Orenburg had offered some kind of resistance. But in the 26th minute, Pablo Solari opened the scoring.

Then Manfred Ugalde took the floor, who converted a penalty seven minutes later, and scored from the game in the 53rd minute. Interestingly, the match was watched from the stands by the striker of Kazan "Rubin" Mirlind Daku, who is due to transfer to Spartak in the coming days. The transfer of the club's star striker from Tatarstan to the red and white ranks may become one of the main deals of this summer.

With the arrival of the Albanian, Ugalde will be one of those who may not have enough space in the squad. Especially considering that he hasn't played much in the league lately. In the last year and a half, he has dramatically decreased in performance compared to the second half of 2024, when he scored goals in almost every match. But in the game against Orenburg, the Costa Rican showed that he was ready to fight for a place at the base.

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At the end of the match Nail Umyarov and the young Pavel Polekh scored another goal against the visitors, who responded only with Renat Golybin's ball.

Spartak started the season quite cheerfully and made a bid to compete for both trophies, Andrei Chervichenko, the former owner of the red and white, said in an interview with Izvestia.

— It is clear that their head coach, Juan Carcedo, is communicating his demands better and better, and the team is becoming more structured. They would like to strengthen the attack even more — perhaps they will do it at the expense of Dacus," he believes. — But at the same time, it's too early to praise Spartak ahead of time. They haven't played against the strongest opponents yet, but there were already problems in the match with Akhmat, and the victory came at the expense of a fart when the opponent's goalkeeper Shelia made a mistake in the end. It has happened more than once that Spartak starts well, holds a series of matches on the sidelines, fans and journalists arrange the premature coronation of the "future champion", extol any local success with a special emotional strain, and against this background, the players themselves begin to feel dizzy and overwhelmed, which leads to a sharp deterioration in results.

In another match in Group A, Rodina sensationally defeated Rubin at home with a score of 5:0.

Lokomotiv — CSKA

This derby was marked by Dmitry Barinov's first official visit to Cherkizovo (not as part of a friendly match). The former captain and pupil of Lokomotiv left the club in the winter, joining the sworn enemy of the "railwaymen" CSKA. The first six months in the ranks of the army turned out to be a failure — only fifth place in the championship, despite the fact that his former team finished third.

The new season has not started well for both teams. Especially for Lokomotiv, who scored only one point in two league matches. Barinov himself was expected to hear booing and insulting chants from the red-green fans. And after the game, he went up to the Loko fan stand to applaud his former fans, which many perceived as a provocation.Moreover, by his actions, he interrupted the ceremony of awarding Alexei Batrakov the "Steel Rail" — the prize for the best player of the "Locomotive" last season according to the fans.

The match itself took place with the advantage of CSKA. It turned into a goal by Matheus Reis in the 40th minute. After the break, the Army team could have scored a few more times, but Loko was saved by goalkeeper Ilya Lantratov, who is trying to regain his place in the main squad that he lost a couple of years ago. The chance for this appeared after the injury of the first number of the team Anton Mitryushkin, who was injured at the weekend in the second round match of the championship against Dynamo Makhachkala (1:2).

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With his exploits, Lantratov was able to keep the Railwaymen in the game, and in the last minutes of regular time, Alexander Silyanov equalized the score. However, already in the penalty shootout, his shot was the only unsuccessful one out of all ten on both sides — it was parried by the new goalkeeper of CSKA Maxim Borisko, who played the first match after transferring from Kaliningrad Baltic.

Nevertheless, with his goal in the end, Silyanov brought Lokomotiv one point — that's how much is given for a defeat in the post-match series. CSKA scored only two points. Thus, the advantage of the army team in the fight for the first place in Group D is not very big.

"Since both teams didn't play as main squads, a lot depended on who made the least mistakes and who had the best goalkeeper," Nikolai Naumov, former president of Loko, said in a conversation with Izvestia. — As a result, it turned out that the Army team outplayed the Railwaymen, was head and shoulders above them, but Lantratov's brilliant game allowed Lokomotiv to claim at least a draw to the last. And they were able to recoup. Considering that the team is in a very bad state right now, getting at least one point in the derby against an imperfect but still better prepared CSKA is a great success.

In the other match of the group, Rostov defeated Tolyatti Akron 4-0.

The other groups also played two games each these days. In Group B, Dynamo Moscow snatched an away victory over Fakel Voronezh (1-0) in the last minutes, while Krasnodar finished the regular season at home in a draw with Akhmat Grozny (1-1), but won in a penalty shootout. In group C, Zenit St. Petersburg prevailed on its own field over Baltika Kaliningrad (1-0) thanks to a goal by its newcomer Kevin Andrade, who hit the goal of the team from which he transferred at the beginning of the summer. And Samara "Wings of the Soviets" beat Dynamo Makhachkala (2:1).