Translated material
Dressing up trick
Spartak and its coach changed their style and won
The capital's Spartak had a historic day in the Champions League against Marseille. For the first time in the last ten years, in a match of this tournament, the “red-whites” left the field without conceding a single goal. The French champions did the rest themselves - the hosts scored the only goal in this meeting into their own goal.Spartak appeared very unusual in its first Champions League match. It all started with Valery Karpin. The head coach of the “red and whites” exchanged torn jeans with massive belt buckles for a formal suit and a bright, stylish tie. In turn, his team, having left their addiction to ball control at home, in Marseille appeared as an unusually counter-attacking team, defending mainly with numbers and the skill of the goalkeeper.
A cool goalkeeper who saves in almost hopeless situations is another unusual detail in the changed Spartak style. Andrei Dikan appeared unexpectedly in Karpin’s team, and the match in Marseille was only his second for the “red-whites”. And before that, he shone mainly in modest clubs - he was a full-time penalty taker in Khabarovsk SKA-Energia, became the best goalkeeper of the first division in Kuban, and after a year on a business trip to Tavriya Simferopol, he returned to Terek. From there, by the way, this season he was first invited to the Ukrainian national team at the age of 33. And soon, thanks to his Russian citizenship, he ended up at Spartak and made his debut in the Champions League.
In Marseille, Dikan’s biography will probably still be studied. Along with those moments when he saved Spartak from seemingly inevitable goals. However, almost all of the most dangerous moments at the visitors' goal occurred in the second half. In the first, Marseille, although they had the advantage, did not make many shots on target. True, Spartak did not shine in attack either - McGeady had not yet found a common language with his partners, Kombarov did not always have enough time to execute accurate passes, Alex, although superior in speed of thinking, was clearly inferior in speed of movement, and Welliton was tightly covered by three home defense players.
After the break, when Marseille’s advantage became total, Dikan had to demonstrate his reaction. But in the two most dangerous moments, only luck saved him - Lucho Gonzalez headed the ball centimeters to the right of the goal, and already in stoppage time, who replaced the missed Brandao Gignac, sent the ball into the post with a powerful blow.
By that time, Spartak was already leading - 1:0. The visitors' rare foray down the left flank ended with a traditional cross into the center of the penalty area. Typically, Marseille defenders dealt with such situations without experiencing any difficulty. But this time Azpiluketa overdid it, and the ball, bouncing off his foot, crawled under the goalkeeper into the goal. “Luck was probably on our side. But in football there is a lot of luck. However, it is much more important that all the players showed utmost dedication and deserved this success,” Valery Karpin was pleased. But to what extent the victory in Marseille was truly deserved, Spartak still has to prove in Moscow: on September 28, the “red-whites” will again have to change their style to an attacking one - it will probably be impossible to leave the group without a home victory over Zilina.