“Rostov” took the minority – Newspaper Kommersant No. 56 (7501) dated 04/03/2023

Saturday’s misfires of Spartak, which played in the 21st round in a draw with Akhmat, and Dynamo, which lost to Sochi, were taken advantage of by other contenders for high places in the Russian championship, who played on Sunday with outsiders. Rostov, the closest pursuer of the Zenit championship leader, despite not taking a penalty and sending off in the first half, managed – 2:1 – on his field with Torpedo, CSKA defeated on the road – 2:0 – Fakel , and Krasnodar, also away, defeated – 6:0 – Khimki.

The next round of the Russian championship crowned an interesting match. The rivals represented opposite niches in the hierarchy of superiority, but the plot did not correspond to the boring “paper” layout. On the contrary, he came out pissed off.

“Torpedo” played against “Rostov” with the newly appointed new head coach – Pep Clotet, although nothing Spanish in his football, of course, was not visible. Football is the same as usual – not so bad in terms of density, hard work, but without ball control and spark. However, Rostov also lacked it for a long time – for more than half an hour there was some kind of routine game without a hint of an explosion.

And suddenly, out of the blue, an emergency happened. The episode was harmless. Corner Rostovites, the struggle of their striker Nikolai Komlichenko with Maxim Turishchev – the usual, without a hint of rudeness. It was unrealistic to understand from the outside who was who here, both of them tried. But referee Alexei Amelin went to watch the replay and pointed to the penalty mark. Sheaves of fire, mixed with bewilderment, whipped from Clotet’s eyes in those seconds.

True, everything worked out for Torpedo thanks to goalkeeper Yegor Baburin. Penalty by Dmitry Poloz, already the 14th Rostov penalty in the championship, he repelled with an incomparable jump into the corner.

And soon “Torpedo” became the favorite of the match. Danil Glebov drove into Ivan Enin’s leg so unceremoniously and hard that his tackle did not require careful study with the help of VAR. The removal was the cleanest, and Rostov lost the captain and core player in the middle of the field. In theory, he had to endure until the pause in order to rethink tactics during it. But immediately after Glebov left for the locker room, the Rostovites launched a fan attack, and Andrei Langovich fired from two and a half dozen meters into the top corner.

The next Rostov long-range strike, after the rest, was even more spectacular. Yevgeny Chernov shot from about the same distance as Langovich, but adjusted to the ball flying at him after the torpedo clearance, which complicated the task. However, the defender coped with it as if he was constantly rehearsing a trick.

“Torpedo” seemed to be sent to a deep knockout, but immediately presented its own masterpiece. David Karaev sent the ball to the top nine with a soft “parachute” and returned the intrigue, which, however, did not transform into an extraordinary result. “Rostov” won and, lagging behind “Zenith” by seven points, three points ahead of “Spartak”.

Before the Rostovites on the final day of the 21st round, two more clubs played their matches, which look like contenders for the championship medals. They met, as it happened, with opponents located in the table directly in front of Torpedo, that is, also outsiders who only dream of surviving in the Premier League, but these were still different games.

Krasnodar, which was slightly behind the lead group, smashed Khimki 6-0. But such a victory hardly drew on great valor, given the persistent feeling that Khimki is now so out of order that it would be a miracle if they suddenly come out.

The match between CSKA and Fakel was different in style. Voronezh on their field kept quite decently. For everything to be completely good, there were not enough little things like accuracy. We are talking about that episode in the first half, when, after throwing the ball out of touch, the soldier Ivan Oblyakov rushed into the penalty area from Irakli Kvekveskiri, and a moment later he fell like a knocked down. Referee Pavel Kukuyan at first reacted to the fall completely indifferently. It was impossible to discern even the slightest sign of doubt in his face and movements as to whether there had been a violation or not. No, Kukuyan was not going to stop the game. And Oblyakov, meanwhile, sat down on the lawn, as if he had decided to organize a sit-in as a sign of protest. And, as it turned out, he was right. A few minutes later, VAR found a hook from Kvekveskiri, and Fedor Chalov scored a penalty.

The unlucky violator could well be rehabilitated for his mistake immediately after the break. Kvekveskiri coolly adjusted to the ball, famously struck, but landed on the crossbar. And CSKA did not miss its goal, once again hitting the target. A flank attack that suffered in agony led to a goal, which was not allowed to disappear in vain by the tall Anton Zabolotny, who reached his head to the canopy at such a height that most players would not even try to reach the ball. And Oblyakov, who was very energetic that day, jumped out at his discount.

Having won, CSKA moved to the fourth line of the table. And his backlog from Spartak, which closes the top three, is now only three points.

Alexey Dospekhov