“Dynamo” experiment was a success – Newspaper Kommersant No. 169 (7370) of 09/14/2022

Two matches took place at the start of the second round of the group stage of the Russian Football Cup for Premier League teams. Pari Nizhny Novgorod, having played with Khimki 1:1 in regular time, took the upper hand on penalties – 5:3, Dynamo defeated Akhmat – 2:1.

To the confrontation in the Cup of Russia “Nizhny Novgorod” and “Khimki” arrived in a fundamentally different condition. If Nizhny Novgorod, who, after a problematic start to the season, had a series of five matches without defeat, it was clearly positive, then Khimki, on the contrary, was purely negative. A draw in the previous round of the championship with “Wings of the Soviets”, despite the fact that the opponent did not convert a penalty, did not break the series of the Moscow Region club without victories, which reached six meetings. But just recently, he defeated the same Nizhny Novgorod in the Premier League – 3:0.

Directly in the Cup, the teams also started in a diametrically opposite way. Nizhny beat Lokomotiv 2-0, while Khimki lost to Krasnodar with the same result. In general, in their current position, when it is time to think first of all about survival in the top division of the Russian championship, somehow it’s not up to the Cup.

It is not surprising that the third mentor of the Khimki team this season, Spartak Gogniev, put up not the most combat squad in Nizhny Novgorod. But the hosts resorted to an even deeper personnel rotation, and their best player, Nikolai Kalinsky, was not even in the application.

Quite dry in form and content, the game was revealed only at the end of regular time. First, Timur Suleymanov brought Nizhny forward from Edgar Sevikyan’s pass, but Denis Glushakov, closing a cross from Reziuan Mirzov, immediately got even. Then the guests remained in the minority after the removal of Ilya Kamyshev, but it was not far before the final whistle and the penalty shootout. Penalties, which according to the regulations in case of a draw in regular time, to determine the owner of the bonus point, were better performed by the hosts – 5:3. The key save was made by Artur Nigmatullin, who parried the blow of Alexander Lomovitsky. Nizhny Novgorod scored five points and are currently leading in Group A.

Group C match Dynamo – Akhmat both teams needed to correct the current situation. Muscovites not only lost in the opening round of the Cup of Russia to Rostov, but also recently suffered their first defeat in the championship – from Sochi. Whether this is a crisis or just a coincidence, the meeting with the people of Grozny could have partly cleared it up. And they even fired the head coach Andrey Talalaev two days ago, who seemed to have already taken root in the club for the more than two seasons that he worked in it. Akhmat was temporarily headed by his assistant Yuri Nagaytsev.

However, Dynamo faced a difficult task – to definitely win the Cup in order to strengthen their position in the group, but preferably in such a way as to save resources for Saturday’s match in the championship with Zenit.

Although even taking into account this condition, the composition of the white-blue ones looked too experimental. In such a combination of players, the team probably did not really have time to train. The same Eli Dasa and Mathias Norman had just made their debut in the championship, and Mumi Ngamalyo entered the field for the first time.

However, already in the opening, Fedor Smolov, who had lost his place in the starting line-up, was reminded of himself, to whom Yaroslav Gladyshev played well. Having realized his moment, he soon brought Ngamalyo to the scoring position, but the Cameroonian failed to deal with goalkeeper Mikhail Oparin one on one. But Ivan Oleinikov dealt with Dynamo and quickly equalized the score. And in the middle of the first half, the hosts still dropped out due to injury Norman. But they did not notice the loss of the Norwegian, and Gladyshev punished Akhmat for another mistake in defense. He could well have swung at a double, and even at a hat-trick. Dynamo had plenty of sharp attacks, and on the whole it played easily, liberated, and even the newcomers Das and Ngamale took an active part in all this.

True, the slippery difference until the last minutes of the match kept the Muscovites in suspense. Their implementation was still lame, and a good shot from Alexander Kutitsky was beaten off by the Grozny post. As a result, Oleinikov almost deprived the blue and whites of a full-fledged victory when he hit their goalkeeper Igor Leshchuk from a lethal distance. Dynamo still scored three points.

Alexander Ilyin