SKIF and Lokomotiv-Kuban closed 2022 with victories

Two more Kuban teams successfully completed 2022. SKIF and Lokomotiv-Kuban joined handball Kuban. “MK in Kuban” talks about the last matches of the year.

Happy Petersburg

The SKIF handball players had a difficult task. They were to visit Zenit in St. Petersburg. Pitertsy loomed slightly ahead in the standings – just one victory away. SKIF had a rather limited squad: Batyr Bidanok and Tran Xuan Viet could not recover, having missed the lost match in Perm. There was also a defeat in the home match against Zenit in the starting round.

These circumstances did not prevent Krasnodar from closing the year on a positive note. They unequivocally won the loudest victory of the season, all the rest were achieved over rivals with a lower tournament position.

At the same time, St. Petersburg is a pretty good place for SKIF, conducive to success. In the last two seasons, Krasnodar managed to “profit” here with victories, despite the fact that each time it was the opponent who was in the status of a favorite.

The match itself was not easy. The first half, in which the rivals regularly changed leadership, remained with the owners of the site – 15:14. The second half became decisive. After it started, the guests “concreted” their gates. Defense led by goalkeeper Alexei Krikunov allowed the opponents to score only four goals in twenty minutes. True, in the attack the main load fell on Savely Shalabanov. During this time, he scored five times, two more goals by Timofey Maslennikov squeezed in here. Ten minutes before the end, the guests were leading – 21:19.

Help arrived in time for Shalabanov, who himself did not slow down. Welterweight SKIF scored a damn dozen goals. For thirteen goals, he spent eighteen shots and became the leader in performance in the entire Super League: 66 goals in eleven matches. Ruslan Dashko scored five times each (third place in the entire tournament) and Anton Volkov. For the latter, this is a particularly important point. The SKIF captain did not shine with performance in the season, he was often injured. Now he scored important goals in the final ten minutes, and he put a spectacular end to the match by converting the “air”: he caught the ball in a jump in the opponent’s six-meter zone and sent it to the goal. And Krikunov eventually showed a grandmaster’s 42 percent of reflected shots.

Krasnodar’s victory was solid – 28 : 24. They equaled on points with Zenit – eleven each. The teams are tied for fifth and sixth places. Recall: the sixth left for the New Year holidays and the women’s “Kuban”.

– In the second half, we began to succeed in defense. Brought the ball to the right in the attack. Well, the goalkeeper Krikunov had a great match, – commented on the victory of SKIF coach Dmitry Karlov.

The teams have already started the second round. Previously, the Don Cossacks from Taganrog were removed from the tournament, and eleven teams remained in the men’s super league. On January 19, SKIF will play at home against CSKA Moscow, a team with many Kuban handball students and head coach Oleg Khodkov from Krasnodar.

Roller coaster at Basket Hall

Basketball “Lokomotiv-Kuban” ended the year at home. The rival was Parma-Pari. The Perm team is coached by Evgeny Pashutin, a landmark coach for Krasnodar. Loko won the European Cup under his leadership in 2013. After that, he returned to the team and worked in Krasnodar a year ago.

In the first round of the current season of the VTB United League, the opponents played an enchanting match. Then Loko was able to level the score in the hardest ending, and then put the squeeze on the opponent in extra time – 92 : 85. The meeting in Krasnodar did not go into overtime, although at some point his silhouette appeared on the horizon.

The victory was important for Loko in terms of the tournament as well. Previously, the team lost twice in Moscow – MBA and CSKA. Success in the last match of the year allowed us to gain a stronger foothold in the top six. Actually, Parma, which was seventh, is aiming for this place, especially since a number of injured players returned to the Ural team.

However, at first, the situation did not favor a hot ending. Krasnodar really hosted the site. Gradually gaining advantage, reaching up to ten points, but it quickly, like in a casino, descended back. And so several times during the meeting.

American newcomers are settling in Loko. Giant Chris Horton felt confident. The striker played well in attack, did not deny himself the pleasure of scoring, was reliable in defense, made a highlight block shot.

Five minutes before the end, Loko led fifteen points – 80 : 65. Krasnodar’s Serbian legionnaire Ivan Paunich carried the ball into the ring, but his opponent “sheathed” him. And pretty quickly the advantage of the hosts began to melt. The guests were three points behind and were entitled to two penalties for a second and a half before the end. The Senegalese center Malik Dime scored the first shot, the second was deliberately lubricated in the hope of rebounding from partners. But the ball ended up in the hands of Andrei Martyuk from Krasnodar. Home win – 88:86 (25:19, 23:22, 22:20, 18:25).

The head coach of Lokomotiv-Kuban Alexander Sekulich called the game “a real rollercoaster”.

– Parma-Pari is a good and serious team, but if we made fewer mistakes, we would win much more confidently. I drew the players’ attention to the fact that we need to stay focused and continue to play team basketball, that we need a confident game and a clear defense. Both of our newcomers helped us a lot. Perhaps it was easier for Horton today, because he came from the Israeli championship, where he had regular game practice. Now there will be a short break – we will try to use this time to better integrate both into the team.

And Chris Horton got into the symbolic team of the tour. The American forward has fifteen points, nine rebounds and four steals.

Loko won for the tenth time this season. The team remains in fifth place, Nizhny Novgorod is in the same position. The opponents will have a face-to-face meeting in Krasnodar on January 5th.

Dynamo volleyball players can’t stop a series of failures. The team of Pavel Zabuslaev suffered another defeat. “White-blue” was visiting “Tulitsa”. The day before, by the way, the Final Four of the Cup of Russia took place in Tula. It was won by Dynamo Moscow, having defeated Lokomotiv Kaliningrad in the final.

Alas, Krasnodar suffered a dry defeat – 0:3 (25:27, 23:25, 19:25). They were close to success in the first two games. In both “Tulitsa” won with a two-point minimum gap for volleyball, but the guests did not have set points.

Alisa Glushchenko scored fourteen points against Dynamo, Maria Bogovskaya scored twelve. Surprisingly often, Krasnodar lost balls when serving, there were twelve errors – they gave almost half of the game to their opponents.

There is still a home game in 2022. On December 28, Dynamo will host Proton Saratov, which is in fifth place. Krasnodar occupy only the eleventh position.