“Now football has been made as if behind some kind of locks. It’s just a mockery of the fans.”

This is what the illustrious veteran of the army club Vladimir Alekseevich Ponomarev says and continues: “Why is this necessary? There are also video cameras that monitor the order. Nothing for these cards. If there are any obstacles, people will stop going to stadiums altogether. We already have very poor attendance.” And it’s hard to disagree with him. But the RFU stubbornly continues to prevent fans from enjoying their favorite game, introducing incomprehensible and unnecessary “passports”.

So, for the cup game with the Samara team, the handsome stadium on Peschanaya missed several thousand fans of the game of millions. And even though the match itself was of little interest in terms of the game itself, the fact remains – “Fan ID is the killer of football!”.

Cup of Russia. 1/2 finals (RPL way). First match 2:2. CSKA – “Wings of the Soviets” 1:0 (0:0). Goal: Bale, 90+3

The parents of CSKA Moscow goalkeeper Igor Akinfeev Vladimir Vasilyevich and Irina Vladimirovna, as well as his son Daniel, struck the first symbolic blow in the match. Such a solemn and touching ceremony is in honor of the 20th anniversary of the debut of the most important army gate guard, Igor Vladimirovich Akinfeev. The CSKA players themselves came to the match with “wings” in a uniform with an emblem dedicated to this event – not every goalkeeper in the world has two decades of playing in the frame of one club. And in CSKA there is such an exclusive – Igor “our everything” Akinfeev. The hero of the day himself remained on the bench of CSKA due to “medical indications”, giving way to Torop at the gate.

This, in fact, is all that is intelligible can be said about the cup confrontation. Since there was no actual game on the field. The army team, in front of their fans and in front of their legend (Igor Akinfeev can already be considered exactly like that), did not show anything football. “Wings of the Soviets” played on equal terms, used long passes, but even they can hardly find at least one attacking action that could be called “assist”.

Neither the team of Vladimir Fedotov, nor the wards of Igor Osinkin, during the 90 minutes of the match, did not bother to tightly, powerfully and accurately break through Torop and Lomaev on goal. There was a moment for Chalov, who sent a leather sphere into the crossbar after a corner. The captain of CSKA Zabolotny was remembered only for martial arts, but this is football, not wrestling.

Samara forwards Pisarsky (in the protocol issued to journalists by the CSKA press service, for some reason he was listed as Sychev) and Tsypchenko either forgot to enter the field, or did not fall into the 4-4-2 scheme. So it turned out that by the break, both teams “shot” a couple of shots on target.

But after the tea party, the same Pisarsky already had at least three chances, but the accuracy of his blows was not enough, and Akinfeev’s substitute Vladislav Torop “entered” the game a couple of times. A couple of army men, Moizes and Agapov, “suffered” from the Samara child prodigy with a double surname, but this still did not work.

CSKA, after the break, completely stopped moving to half of Samara, the first such attack took place only in the 77th minute – Agapov’s shot went near the upper cross of Lomaev’s goal. Fedotov released Carrascal and Medina, the result is the same – zero.

Curiosity happened in the middle of the second segment of the match. The referee of the meeting Artyom Lyubimov saw that the army goalkeeper picked up the ball after Willian Roshi’s pass back. But then the army negotiators entered the “case”, and the referee of the match “changed his shoes” – he canceled the most dangerous free kick in Torop’s possessions. “Wings of the Soviets” argued for the sake of order and continued the game. The guests had a chance when Agapov and Zainutdinov lost the air, and Costanza hit his head so that the football projectile had one way – into the CSKA net. But the post played for the hosts.

Osinkin’s team definitely did not deserve such a final, which happened in stoppage time. The Samarans coach was already preparing substitutions for the penalty shoot-out: Frolov was supposed to replace Lomaev. But this was not necessary. The goalless game ended illogically – but this is football, and looking for logic in it is a disastrous business.

Brazilian Willian Rocha shot at random, and spotted treacherously for the “CS” leaked into Lomaev’s net from his own partner Glen Bale. The post-match penalties would certainly have been more fair, but the army team was unspeakably lucky.

Now CSKA will play against Ural in the finals of the RPL Path, and Krylya Sovetov will go to the Path of Regions. This is the current regulations for the new Cup – even the losing team has a chance of success, having moved to the “lower” part of the grid.

Vladimir Sabadash.

Author’s photo