Russian Football Championship

Lokomotiv's incredibly tense match with CSKA ended with the championship leader losing to the 15th team before this round - 2:3, despite Jo's seventh goal in the Premier League. After this, three teams caught up with the leader at once.

Lokomotiv's ever-increasing stubbornness was predictable. Loko lost each match with a better game than the previous one. All achievements were negated by the railwaymen's ugly defensive play - Loko's varied defenders not only mostly did not see each other until this season, but also do not speak the same language. For the game with CSKA, Slavolub Muslin, who had previously made two draws in eight matches, deployed three central defenders and two “wingers” at once. The scheme is new. It partially worked, although Lokomotiv, in general, did not solve the problems at the back. But the nominal hosts now have a chance for a counter game. And it turned out that not only Muslin’s team, but also his opponent had big problems in the game.

The tone of the game was set by an episode in the tenth minute: two attacks in a row on different goals, foreshadowing the entire future game. First, Vadim Evseev rushed along the flank and moved to the center, and the CSKA defense slept through him. The nominal defender went one on one with the goalkeeper, but did not hit the corner, but in the center. The army team responded to this with a series of attacks, developing mainly using the right flank, where two army men (Rolan Gusev plus one of the Brazilians) opposed Loko's left winger Marian Gad. During the half, after such attacks, CSKA managed to dangerously move the ball into the center of the opponent’s penalty area four times. Half of these passes ended in goals, but by the time Gusev took advantage of Jo’s cross, who had shifted to the right, and the connivance of the defenders, CSKA was already losing. Dmitry Sychev distinguished himself. His long-range shot found the back of Elver Rahimic and ricocheted off it into the goal. Moreover, by the time Lokomotiv opened the scoring, the game advantage was on its side - it was hot at the CSKA goal. Dmitry Loskov could have scored, for example.

CSKA's third attack from the right with a transfer to the center ended with another save by Polyakov and a corner. The fourth threat from the right arose after this very corner and ended with an unhindered strike from the forgotten Jo. Everything began to develop for Lokomotiv according to the scenario of either of the two matches with Spartak, but the performance of Muslin's team has improved even in the three days that have passed since the last of them.

At the end of the half, Lokomotiv locked the opponent in the penalty area. Once Akinfeev, leaving the gate, pushed his opponent, who was standing with his back to him, into the kidney area with his hands - the referee did not react. In addition, the CSKA goalkeeper parried another tight shot from Loskov almost point-blank. Considering what was happening on the field, the whistle for the break was more advantageous for CSKA, but the resumption of the game turned out to be even worse for the army team.

Exactly two minutes into the second half, Lokomotiv again began to fire at the other team's goal with impunity. The defenders took Diniyar Bilyaletdinov's shot, but Gary O'Connor's new shot from 20 meters went straight into the corner. The score was even again - 2:2. And with all the clownery performed by Loko's defense, the rest of the lines of this team by this time made a better impression than the army ones.

It was clear that CSKA was nervous. Not only Akinfeev, who, not for the first time this year, began to practice reckless exits from the gate. Zhirkov grappled with Sychev, Daniel Carvalho, compensating for a foul unnoticed by Valentin Ivanov, just as unnoticed by the referee, punched Sergei Gurenko. The worst thing happened in the 67th minute. Vasily Berezutsky played a header towards the head of Gad flying towards the ball, and it was a terrible blow and a terrible sight. The army man escaped with a broken eyebrow. Judging by the appearance of the Slovakian being taken away in an ambulance, he at least had a fracture of his facial bones.

This collision did not diminish the determination of the opponents to fight and fight. Duda, who replaced Daniel Carvalho, hit Polyakov dangerously on goal, and O'Connor responded in a similar way from Lokomotiv. Dudu, who came to the near corner of the goalkeeper's area, almost brought his team ahead after a corner, and almost immediately a similar moment at the CSKA goal ended with a goal.

Lokomotiv's desire to win was emphasized by defender Oleg Pashinin's move to take a corner to the opponent's goal, although it was risky. After all, the match was already in its last ten minutes, and the guests organized enough high-speed counterattacks in this match. Pashinin took the same risk last summer when, with the score 2:2 in the Lokomotiv-CSKA match, he took a corner kick at the same goal in the 89th minute. But then Lokomotiv did not lose 29 matches in a row and was convinced of the complete favor of luck. Who could have imagined then, after Pashinin scored a goal in that raid and brought Lokomotiv a 3:2 victory, that the railway workers would not only miss out on gold, but would not even get into the Champions League?

Yesterday Pashinin took a risk again, but in a completely different situation. This time the defender hit the crossbar with his head, then was ready to finish the ball into the goal. But besides him, two or three more representatives of the attacking side rushed to the flying ball, and another Loko defender, Branislav Ivanovich, was ahead of everyone. In general, who scored the decisive goal no longer mattered. Lokomotiv interrupted the terrible series. But CSKA did not break its unbeaten streak against Loko, which has now reached five games.

CSKA could have been ahead of three teams after that. "Tom" - but it did not win at home against "Saturn". “Moscow” - however, not only did it not win at home against “Spartak” from Nalchik, but in general barely escaped from it. And Rubin could still become a leader if they had defeated Spartak with a difference of seven goals. Of course, Kazan was satisfied with a double victory (as well as a 15th home victory and zero defeats in 19 home matches with the team from Moscow). But now three teams have scored the same number of points as CSKA.

ANDREY Kommersant-SEMYANINOV

Lokomotiv picked up CSKA's scheme