Translated material
Belous surrendered "Moscow"
The first resignation of the season occurred in the “townspeople” camp
It is with great difficulty that points are being given to the recognized favorites, and the competition is increasingly intense. In just one match of the 4th round there was a victory with a difference of more than one goal. Most of the remaining games were decided by minutes of injury time. The first resignation also took place, but not on the coaching bridge, but in the leadership of FC Moscow.The hosts had a hard time in this round. Only Rubin, Terek and Krylya Sovetov won at home. Moreover, the defeats in Kazan and Grozny did not upset the coaches of the losing teams too much. “Ramzan Akhmatovich, I congratulate you on Terek’s victory, but I want to emphasize that this is the first and last loss,” CSKA head coach Valery Gazzaev, immediately after the defeat, found some pleasant words for Terek president Ramzan Kadyrov. On this day, he accepted congratulations not only on the football victory, but also on the first anniversary of taking office as the head of the Chechen Republic and responded in the spirit that this was not the last victory over the army. So the parties parted ways, satisfied with each other - the holiday in Grozny was clearly a success. And the only thing that upset CSKA was Vagner Love’s injury during training, due to which the Brazilian will miss three weeks.
In Kazan, it seems that the holiday will last throughout this year. “Rubin” gave itself another gift for the 50th anniversary of the club, defeating “Tom” - 2:1. “I won’t evaluate in detail now, I’ll refrain. But I’m pleased that the guys fought to the end. We could have turned the tide of a difficult game, but, unfortunately, it was not possible,” Siberian coach Valery Petrakov did not look particularly upset, commenting on the game in which first Kvirkvelia, closing the far post, opened the scoring, and then the teams exchanged successfully taken penalties.
But in other matches there was more room for emotions. For example, Yuri Belous’s farewell to Moscow, where he worked as general director for more than five years, was very touching. “The main reason for my resignation, despite my love for football, is fatigue. For five years I experienced constant stress. Even while on vacation,” the former general director explained the reasons for his resignation.
It was clear to most of those present in the conference room that Yuri Viktorovich was not leaving Moscow of his own free will. But the reasons why club owner Mikhail Prokhorov decided to change the manager so suddenly remained unclear. Belous hasn’t had much influence on the club’s politics in recent years. He did not have the right of financial signature and absolutely all decisions had to be coordinated with the main shareholder of the club and his advisors, with whom he could not always get an audience. Yuri Belous's own initiatives rarely found a response from the owners. Although, for example, the idea of holding the national championship match “Moscow” - “Zenith” in London at the Stamford Bridge stadium brought several fun minutes.
As an official performing representative functions, for example, in the Russian Premier League, Belous seemed to suit the top management. It is quite possible that if it weren’t for Moscow’s current deplorable tournament position and frank comments - the general director in one of his interviews made it clear that the lack of funds for winter selection was explained by the division of the business of Mikhail Prokhorov and Vladimir Potanin - Belous would have been forgiven for minor sins like harsh treatment of club employees and violation of labor discipline.
“Moscow” said goodbye to its general director without fireworks. Although everything was going to the point that the “citizens” would defeat the seemingly doomed “Khimki”. But, having quickly taken the lead 2:0, the Muscovites noticeably slowed down and, having received a return goal at the end of the half, were unable to defend their advantage after the break. These are the current trends in the Russian championship - lesser teams are ready, gritting their teeth, to snatch draws in a tough fight, and if they are lucky, even victories.
However, not everyone is lucky. Luch-Energia, which two years ago was considered one of the “anniversary” teams, is also forced to fight for every draw this season. Zoran Vulich's team was close to the desired result in Samara. Having missed a shot from Tikhonov, who skillfully executed a free kick, Luch equalized the score and was even close to victory. But in the 90th minute, the Far Easterners conceded a goal themselves, and Vulich could only express cautious doubts about whether it was worth counting.
In the last minutes, it has now become fashionable to skip. Saturn was also unlucky. An expensive football project in the Moscow region threatens to turn into another huge failure if Gadzhi Gadzhiev’s team does not start gaining points. In the off-season, Saturn bought a lot, but somehow unprincipled, and Gadzhi Muslimovich even let it slip: they took players no stronger than those they had. In any case, the turnover of funds turned out to be impressive, and the general director of the “aliens” Boris Zhiganov even promised the fans a place in the top three.
If the team had played the same way all the time as they did in the first half against Lokomotiv, then, quite likely, they would have believed Zhiganov. After spending the first 45 minutes in attacks, during one of which Topic opened the scoring with a backheel, Saturn conceded just before the break from the penalty spot. And then, having not come up with anything worthy in the second half of the match, in the 85th minute he even missed a draw - Sychev’s free-kick, corrected by a ricochet from one of the hosts’ defenders, turned out to be a complete surprise for Kinski.
The St. Petersburg residents also fell victims of the last seconds. Having started the match in Yaroslavl briskly, Zenit quickly achieved a two-goal advantage and seemed determined to bring the matter to a rout. But a completely unobvious penalty plus the phenomenal ability of Denis Boyarintsev to score the decisive goals in the last minutes saved Shinnik from defeat - 2:2. For small clubs, such draws mean more than anniversary victories.
Results of the 4th round matches. "Spartak" - "Amkar" - 1:1 (Pavlyuchenko 62 - Inyats 90) , "Spartak-Nalchik" - "Dynamo" - 0:2 (Dimidko 67, Fernandez 88) , "Moscow" - "Khimki" - 2:2 (Bracamonte 34, Lopez 38 - Nizamutdinov 45, Antipenko 80 ), "Terek" - CSKA - 1:0 (Kuzmichev 65 ), "Saturn" - "Lokomotiv" - 1 :2 ( Topich 9 - Bilyaletdinov 45 from the penalty spot, Sychev 85 ), "Rubin" - "Tom" - 2:1 (Kvirkvelia 65, Semak 75 from the penalty spot - Mladenov 77 from the penalty spot) , "Krylya Sovetov" - - "Luch-Energia" - 2:1 (Tikhonov 66, Belozerov 90 - Shevchenko 81) , "Shinnik" - "Zenith" - 2:2 ( Buznikin 61 from the penalty spot, Boyarintsev 90 - Pogrebnyak 42, Timoshchuk 44 from the penalty spot ).
Premier League
| 1. "Ruby" | 4 | 4 | 0 | 0 | 7--2 | 12 |
| 2. Dynamo | 4 | 3 | 1 | 0 | 6--1 | 10 |
| 3. "Lokomotiv" | 4 | 3 | 0 | 1 | 6--3 | 9 |
| 4. "Amkar" | 4 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 6--3 | 7 |
| 5. CSKA | 4 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 4--2 | 7 |
| 6. "Spartak" | 4 | 1 | 3 | 0 | 5--4 | 6 |
| 7. “Wings of the Soviets” | 4 | 2 | 0 | 2 | 5--5 | 6 |
| 8. "Terek" | 4 | 2 | 0 | 2 | 4--7 | 6 |
| 9. Zenit | 4 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 5--5 | 5 |
| 10. “Beam-Energy” | 4 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 3--4 | 4 |
| 11. "Tom" | 4 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 3--4 | 4 |
| 12. "Saturn" | 4 | 1 | 0 | 3 | 5--6 | 3 |
| 13. "Spartak" N | 4 | 1 | 0 | 3 | 3--6 | 3 |
| 14. "Shinnik" | 4 | 0 | 2 | 2 | 4--6 | 3 |
| 15. "Moscow" | 4 | 0 | 2 | 2 | 4--7 | 2 |
| 16. Khimki | 4 | 0 | 2 | 2 | 5--10 | 2 |