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Lokomotiv won the odd match of the final again

The fifth match of the final series of the Russian Open Championship - KHL Championship took place in Kazan. The game between Ak Bars and Yaroslavl Lokomotiv was notable for the fact that during the entire 60 minutes the referees did not issue a single penalty minute. Lokomotiv won this fair match - 3:2. The winner of the Gagarin Cup may be named on Friday. And the leaders of the Continental Hockey League announced the signing of an agreement with the hockey players’ union.

Lokomotiv goalkeeper Georgiy Gelashvili refrained from interviews during the playoffs, but people close to the goalkeeper said that he quickly recovered from the fourth match, when he was replaced after conceding five goals. Already on Tuesday during training it was clear that the goalkeeper was in good shape and was ready to play in the starting lineup again. The coaching staff of the Yaroslavl club breathed a sigh of relief. Although Gelashvili’s replacement Sergei Zvyagin did not miss a single goal in the last meeting, he only appeared on the ice for one period and the score was already 2:5. At this point, the teams were simply finishing the match.

The KHL Disciplinary Committee aggravated the problems with the composition of the Kazan club, recalling that defender Grigory Panin cannot appear in the fifth match, since his ten-minute suspension was the third of the season, which means that according to the rules he must serve a disqualification. After this became known, the team’s doctors from Tataria did everything to get Andrei Mukhachev, who had an unpleasant shoulder injury, back on his feet. As a result, the defenseman came on the ice, and Zinetula Bilyaletdinov did not have to add additional burden to Ilya Nikulin and Andrey Pervyshin, who, it seems, practically never leave the ice.

Andrey Pervyshin co-authored the most curious goal in this final. In the second period, Yaroslavl forward Alexei Kudashov threw the puck at the opposite side so that it would not remain in the zone, but hit the opponents’ defender’s skate. Frederic Norrena did not have time to react to the ricochet. And the score was even.

This missed goal broke the Kazan players a little psychologically. In the first period, they devoted more energy to the attack, and once they managed to break through Gelashvili. It is interesting that at the moment of scoring the goal, the home team's legionnaire Tony Mortensson fell on the goalkeeper, but the referees did not even watch the episode on video. If an attacker is pushed towards the goalkeeper, then according to the rules a foul cannot be called.

Lokomotiv did not fall apart, the hockey players did not immediately run to save the game. Kari Heikkilä understood that if the checkers were exposed, the problems would be much more serious than one missed puck. The residents of Yaroslavl remained calm, as if nothing had happened. They managed to make the most of this only in the second period, in the mentioned episode with the participation of Andrei Pervyshin.

But the third period turned out to be productive. At first, Alexey Mikhnov brought the Yaroslavl team ahead, but a couple of minutes later Dmitry Obukhov equalized the score again. Everything was decided by Frederic Norrena's mistake in the 47th minute. Or rather, he didn’t even make a mistake, he simply succumbed to a feint by Josef Vasicek, who, during the pause, removed the defender and deceived the goalkeeper.

Having taken the lead for the second time in the game, Lokomotiv went into defense and met the opponents in full force on the blue line. Largely thanks to this, the Kazan team was never able to create a single chance at the opponent’s goal. Even after removing the goalkeeper in the last minute, Ak Bars never gained a foothold in the opponent’s zone and did not create a single dangerous moment.

Before the sixth match, Lokomotiv again gained the advantage of their ice, and on Friday the national champion can already be determined. However, Ak Bars already has experience of winning on foreign ice and in even-numbered series matches.

Meanwhile, a press conference was held on Wednesday by KHL President Alexander Medvedev and the leader of the players' union, Andrei Kovalenko. It was announced that hockey players and employers had reached an agreement on a new contract. The hockey players met the clubs halfway and agreed to a salary reduction, but also got preferences for themselves. Thus, the minimum salary of a KHL hockey player should be 300 thousand rubles. per year, and the KHL will help the union create a pension fund.

Alexander Medvedev admitted that he probably will not allow Vyacheslav Bykov and Igor Zakharkin to combine work in the club and in the national team next season. There was such a clause in the regulations last year, but at the last moment they decided to exclude it from the document. The most interesting thing is that on Wednesday information appeared that the former coaches of the army club had apparently signed a contract with the Ufa Salavat Yulaev and were going to create a “base club for the national team” there. If combination is prohibited, they will have to choose where to work. This news was unexpected for the coaching staff, but they still have enough time to think about it. Any contracts signed before April 30 are considered void.

Oleg EREMIN