Translated material
Point to point
Morozov repeated Makarov's scoring record
The best player in Russia last season, Kazan Ak Bars forward Alexey Morozov, scored a goal against Khimik near Moscow in the away match of the 54th round, achieving a repeat of Sergei Makarov's scoring record, set in the 1980/81 USSR Championship. According to the “goal plus pass” system, Morozov scored 79 (32+47) points. Formally, Makarov’s record is still more significant, since the famous CSKA striker in the season 26 years ago, with the same number of points, had a greater number of goals scored - 42 (plus 37 assists). However, in the very near future the leader of Ak Bars will put all questions to rest, since his team has four matches left to play in the regular season, plus let’s not forget the playoffs.Morozov, at the end of the game in Mytishchi, in which the winning goal was scored by Alexei’s partner on the first line of attack Danis Zaripov, said that he was not fixated on the absentee chase with Makarov. “It was more important that the team win,” noted the scorer. Khimik played this match in the absence of its head coach Pyotr Vorobyov. The mentor has high blood pressure and bronchitis. The actions of the hockey players were supervised by Vorobyov’s assistant Valery Shaposhnikov.
The match developed according to an intricate scenario, and the spectators gathered in the stands of the Mytishchi Arena were not bored. The guests opened the scoring, the hosts took the lead at the beginning of the second period, and in the opening 20 minutes Zaripov again brought the Kazan team ahead. Less than two minutes later, Musatov increased the advantage of Zinetula Bilyaletdinov’s team to 4:2, and in the middle of the period, the Mytishchi team twice realized their numerical majority within half a minute and restored the status quo. However, the hockey players from the Moscow region were unable to save themselves from their ninth defeat in their last ten matches.
For completely different reasons, the center of attention of fans and specialists was another match of the next round, a seemingly unremarkable meeting between Siberia and Krylia Sovetov from the point of view of the teams’ position in the table. The leading players of the capital's club, who went on strike due to months of delayed wages and the lack of any prospects for repaying the debt, kept their harsh word and did not fly to Novosibirsk. The management was ready for this, having announced in advance the combat readiness of the youth from the farm club.
This is not the first time in Russian history that teams field green debutants for a game due to a strike. Back in the last century, CSKA reservists were defeated by Nizhnekamsk Neftekhimik with a score of 10:0; in the 2004/05 season, Perm Hammer was in a fever, playing a number of matches using completely inexperienced hockey players. This time, Novosibirsk fans greeted the unknown teenagers from the long-suffering “Wings”, who arrived without head coach Vyacheslav Anisin, with paternal warmth and sincere applause. His assistant Evgeniy Shtepa took over the reins of the team. It is he who works at the club with young people, which is why it was decided that sending Anisin to Siberia was unnecessary.
Not even 30 seconds had passed since the starting throw-in when the Siberians turned on the red light behind the visitors' goal; in the seventh minute they doubled the score, tripled it by the 16th minute, after which they decided to slow down a little. The Muscovites still did not escape defeat - 2:8. The future of this club is unclear. It is already clear that the Setun team will somehow finish the championship, without even a theoretical chance of rising from last place, what will happen next is a complete unknown.
The situation in “Wings”, as well as earlier in the Moscow “Spartak”, which is not yet playing anywhere, caused quite a large public outcry, but teams of masters in team sports in Moscow died (some were later reborn) more than once, so there is nothing unusually tragic in disasters there are no “Wings”. Let us remember how the death of the famous CSKA women's basketball team passed unnoticed and routinely, and that for several years now the capital's army volleyball players, representatives of the most titled club in the world, have been languishing in the third division of the national championship. "Wings", of course, is a team with traditions, but its modest successes on the international stage (one European Cup title) are incommensurate with what the mentioned army teams have achieved.
But for another metropolitan club, Dynamo, things have clearly gone smoothly. Having experienced a bad streak (one win in 11 matches at the end of November and throughout December), the “blue and white” won five victories in the last six meetings. Both Yaroslavl's Lokomotiv on the eve of the holiday and Cherepovets' Severstal immediately after Defender of the Fatherland Day, Vladimir Krikunov's team defeated with the same score 5:2. A good rehearsal for the upcoming playoffs, where the “blue and white” rivals could be their closest geographical neighbors - Khimik, which is experiencing a game crisis, or CSKA, which is performing extremely unevenly. In the match with the Blue and White, the Railwaymen suffered their first defeat since American Paul Gardner took over as head coach of Loko. Under his leadership, the team scored points in nine matches in a row.
Results. Super League. 54th round. "Siberia" - "Wings of the Soviets" - 8:2, "Metallurg" (MG) - "Avangard" - 2:2, "Salavat Yulaev" - "Amur" - 4:0, HC MVD - - "Vityaz" - 4:3 (OT), "Neftekhimik" - "Traktor" - 3:2 (OT), CSKA - "Metallurg" (NK) - 3:1, "Lokomotiv" - SKA - 5:3, Khimik - Ak Bars - 4:5, Severstal - Dynamo - 2:5. The leaders are: Ak Bars - 110 points (50 games), Avangard - 103 (50), Metallurg (MG) - 95 (49), Salavat Yulaev - 94 (49), " Lokomotiv" -- 81 (50).