We combined great today: Mikhail Pashkin, commented on the victory of Khabarovsk SKA-Neftyanik in the first quarter-final of the playoffs

That’s it, the jokes in the national bandy championship are over, the knockout games have begun, when the slightest mistake can cost the team the opportunity to climb the podium. The first (however, like the second) SKA-Neftyanik will play the quarterfinal match in Kazan, on the field of the local Ak Bars-Dynamo.

The forces are clearly not equal. SKA entered the playoffs from the first place in the regular season, overtaking Kuzbass, Vodnik and Dynamo. In turn, “Ak Bars-Dynamo” started the battle for prizes from the last, giving a chance to continue the fight, eighth place. Nevertheless, Kazan may well cause problems for Khabarovsk, there would be a desire.

As for this game, from the first minutes the hosts tried to seize the initiative on the ice, preventing the guests from using their main trump card – speed. It didn’t work out. The army team scored first. On the 5th minute, Tuomas Määttä opened the scoring, then Yuriy Shardakov increased the gap by converting a penalty and only on the 13th minute Ivan Nechaev managed to break the score by scoring from a corner. The teams went to the break when the scoreboard was 1:6 in favor of the Khabarovsk team.

The second half also brought no surprises. The army team steadily increased the difference in goals scored, while the Dynamo team managed to win back only one more goal. Anton Bubnov did it on 74 minutes, also from a set piece. Point in the match put Nikita Ivanov. The final score is 2:11 in favor of the guests from Khabarovsk.

Goals scored:

5, Myayattya Tuomas (Shardakov)

8, Shardakov (pen.)

13, Nechaev I. (Korev Evgeny, corner)

13, Darkovsky R.

26, Myattya Tuomas (Ivanov N., corner)

31, Kalanchin (Darkovsky R.)

38, Ivanov N.

50, Shardakov (Dzhusoev)

58, Chupin S. (Mäatta Tuomas)

60, Kalanchin (Darkovsky R.)

69, Myattya Tuomas (Kalanchin)

74, Bubnov (Korev Evgeniy, corner)

86, Ivanov N. (Shardakov)

– It was a good match from our side. In terms of content, in terms of our attacks, we combined great today, there were very cool attacks. The ball moved as we want – quickly. Of course, all this can be improved, but there were a lot of good moments where we played exactly the pattern that we always try to play. In general, we scored a lot of goals, but it doesn’t matter. The score in the series is 1:0, no matter how many goals you score, the quarter-finals up to two wins, we are getting ready for the next match. Was there any desire after the first half to give the team a rest? There should not be too much, the load today was distributed well, I think, for the entire squad. We had to move well, because the conditions allowed it. Yesterday the ice was so prepared that we couldn’t even practice standard strokes. The quality of the training was very low. I don’t know what they did during the night, but today the ice was very good and thanks to them for that. Here we could combine more and play our game, – noted Mikhail Pashkin, head coach of HC SKA-Neftyanik.

As the coach of the Kazan team admitted, Khabarovsk SKA managed to destroy the plans of the Dynamo team, hence such a score.

– We turned out to be completely unprepared for the speed, the pace offered to us today by SKA-Neftyanik. Hence a large number of mistakes, wrong decisions, and even those moments that we created could not be realized. Hence this result. SKA-Neftyanik with a victory. Getting ready for the next match. What was the focus? The strategy of the game was to impose a low defense and not give space to the opponent’s fast and technical players. What we didn’t get. Well, as I said, even by intercepting well and running away to counterattacks, we did not realize our chances, – emphasized Ivan Maksimov, head coach of HC Ak Bars-Dynamo.

As the head coach of the army team has already mentioned, the score in the quarterfinal series is 1:0 and there is another game ahead, which will also be held in Kazan on March 6, only now not at the Labor Reserves stadium, but on the Rocket ice, and also in a very uncomfortable time for Khabarovsk fans. If the “winged leopards” manage to recoup, then we will see the continuation of the series, if not, SKA goes to the semi-finals where they will fight either Dynamo Moscow or Enisey Krasnoyarsk.

Judging by the previous game of these teams, there is a high probability that they will have to fly not to Krasnogorsk, as previously expected, but to Siberia. However, everything is still ahead, the Muscovites do not intend to give up without a fight and they have every chance to equalize the score in the series.

Outcome of the other quarter-finals:

“Baikal-Energy” – “Kuzbass” – 2:8

Enisey – Dynamo – 7:3

Volga – Vodnik – 5:8

Read also: Khabarovsk “SKA-Neftyanik” beat “Rodina” and reached the playoffs from the first place. The match in Kirov ended with a score of 3:11 in favor of the Khabarovsk team.