On Saturday, the tournament was a real draw “cascade” – all three fights with the participation of the teams that won the first round ended in a draw. And now the victory of one of today’s rivals took at least a day (before Monday’s match between Spartak and Baltika between Spartak and Kaliningrad Baltika) to a clear first middle place in the RPL standings. Indeed, at the beginning of the season, the “bulls” beat Dynamo Moscow (3: 1), and the “leopards” defeated Kaliningrad (2: 0).
Note that although the confrontation between clubs from the same region is known as a rather loud sign of the “Kuban derby”, in reality it has not yet become such, unlike the fight between Krasnodar and Kuban at any level. For now, the emotions and the special tension that accompany any derby are clearly not enough in this matchup.
But perhaps the figure of the Sochi head coach Dmitry Khokhlov, who graduated from the Kuban and managed to lead the yellow-green in August 2015 in a match with the “people of the people” as part of the national championship (1: 1) , in which Andrey also played for his Arshavin team, change the situation?
As for the starting lineups, both the hosts’ mentor Vladimir Ivich and Khokhlov, after experimenting with a huge midweek rotation at the Russian Cup, all but returned to the debut round.
It also drew attention how, on social networks, a few hours after the start of the fight, the guests actually presented the new uniform for the 2023/24 season, which is lifted by the takeoff with the following comment: “Assess the quality Of the delivery”.
After that, the club explains the uniqueness of what is happening; “The football kit for the new season combines innovative design inspired by neural networks with modern technology. The main design element is a graphic pattern created using neural network algorithms.”
This is how far the “leopards” have come in their innovations. Now it remains to be seen how this will directly affect his creativity on the soccer field.
And the guests already in the first minute proved that everything is in order here. Taking advantage of the usual mistake of the central defenders of the “bulls”, the Sochi team organized a characteristic quick counterattack, which was capped off by Miguel. But Matvey Safonov saved a hard blow from a 20-year-old Brazilian from a sharp angle to a corner.
Gradually, “Krasnodar”, out of habit, taking the ball in its possession, tried to start the siege of the “Leopard” gates. However, the hosts constantly made passing mistakes, and their opponents tried to turn each of those mistakes into quick counterattacks. What they regularly achieved: Tension was constantly rising in the opponent’s box (even during a whole series of corners).
Only in the middle of the half, the “citizens” managed a couple of long passes to the opposite goal, which the right back Sergei Volkov almost made an assist. And another pass from the 20-year-old protégé from the club’s Youth Academy ended with a transfer to the center of the box, from where João Batchi fired over the goal.
And the first half ended with a corner unexpectedly executed from the right wing by Eduard Spertsyan, who sent a crooked serve into the near corner, where the defender did not save it, the goalkeeper Nikolai Zabolotny only managed to substitute his hands, and the locals. The central defender Kaio, who came running, hammered the ball into the net literally from the goal line – 1:0, 45th minute.
The second half also began with the sharpest attacks in Sochi. Disrupting a long shot, Safonov didn’t play very skillfully with his head outside the penalty area, but Luka Djordjevic didn’t take the opportunity from him. The goalkeeper then took advantage of Miguel’s strike from distance into the low left corner, and a powerful shot from 18 yards from Artur Yusupov hit the crossbar.
For his part, in the 57th minute, Ilzat Akhmetov seemed to send the ball into the net from four meters, but the central defender and captain of the guests Vanya Drkusich managed to block the shot.
In the game that was then wide open, the opponents attacked in turns, creating tension at both gates. At the same time, Zabolotny had more work, who desperately saved the team from him three times.
To remedy the situation, Khokhlov made three replacements in a row. Sochi began to attack more, although they did not manage to create much tension at the gates of the “bulls”.
In the 81st minute, Juan Córdoba was able to solve all the problems, but the empty corner furthest from the guests missed. But in the retaliatory attack, Safonov has already rescued his teammates by deflecting a Sochi team shot from distance.
In stoppage time, John Cordoba dragged the ball from midfield and shot accurately from outside the penalty area: 2:0, 90 + minute 4.
As a result, Krasnodar led the match to a difficult victory for himself, scoring six points and coming out on top after two rounds in the RPL.
