as part of Siberia

Today in Magnitogorsk, in a match against the vice-champions of the Super League hockey players Magnitogorsk “Metallurg”, the players of the Novosibirsk “Sibir” - a team that experts consider the mystery of the upcoming season - will start the championship. The first game of the season will be largely decisive for the new leaders of the Novosibirsk club - brothers Evgeniy and Alexander Koreshkov. It was in Magnitogorsk that the legendary students of the Ust-Kamenogorsk Torpedo school spent the previous ten seasons. Tomorrow the brothers will be awarded silver medals based on the results of last year’s championship, and personalized jerseys with the players’ names will be hung under the arches of the Romazan Ice Sports Palace when the players end their careers as active hockey players.
After Magnitogorsk, Vladimir Semenov’s team will have an extremely difficult voyage in all respects to Moscow, where “Siberia” awaits the capital’s “Dynamo”. In the offseason, it was the blue and white that made the greatest personnel rotation. A large group of players joined the team, who will play in the capital’s club during the strike in the National Hockey League. But in the second round match, Pavel Datsyuk and his comrades will not be able to help their temporary team, no matter how much they want. The strike in the NHL will officially begin only at noon on September 16, Novosibirsk time. Until this time, not a single player who has a valid contract with NHL clubs has the right to go on the ice. Not only the composition of the Moscow team has changed, but also the coach. Zinetula Bilyaletdinov, who led Dynamo to championship honors in 2000, headed the Russian national team, and Vladimir Krikunov was invited to take his place.
But today, in their style of play and even in the presence of hereditary Dynamo players in the lineup, “Siberia” will give a decent head start to the capital club. Alexander Karpovtsev alone is worth something. But the 34-year-old defensive player will miss the first six rounds to take to the ice for the first time on September 16 in a match against the Perm Molot-Prikamye. Before this, Siberia will have time to play its first home games of the current season. Next Monday, the opponents of the Novosibirsk team will be the players of Voskresensk Khimik, and next Wednesday the current champion of the Super League, the Omsk Avangard, will again come to Novosibirsk.
Another Siberian club, Metallurg from Novokuznetsk, which became the main discovery of the previous season, intends to repeat its last year’s achievements. Nikolai Solovyov's team practically did not change its composition, and the team's playing style did not change. “Metallurg” will rely on combination hockey, in which the main emphasis is on quick movements and control over the puck. The goal to perform no worse than last season was set for his team by the mayor of Novokuznetsk, president of the Metallurg hockey club, Sergei Martin. And this means: Kuznya may not be forgiven for any other result than getting into the top eight of the strongest Super League clubs.
MAXIM GRUSHEV

Kommersant (Novosibirsk) No. 161 dated 01.09.2004, p. 16

The Koreshkov brothers returned to the Urals