The fifth match of the Army Super Series-22/23 in Moscow ended with the victory of the champion 4:2. They took a 3-2 lead. The guests did not lower their sticks until the final siren and twice forced the locals to capitulate to the goalkeeper, who carefully arranged the scoring chances.
Goalkeeper Dmitry Nikolaev, whom experts call almost the strongest in the league, could not cope with the Muscovites’ counterattacks and lost to CSKA for the first time in his career. By the way, it was he who won both victories of the Neva army: 3:2 OT in Moscow and 6:2 in St. Petersburg.
If Sergei Fedorov’s team returned all the wounded and sick (with the exception of striker Yurtaykin), then Roman Rotenberg’s team suffered a loss in the person of the attacker Zhafyarov (Moiseev and Shvets-Rogovoi also left before the end of the season).
Photo source: HC CSKA
The champion seized opportunities at the gates of Nikolaev, while the leaders were unable to find their way to Sharychenkov’s possessions for two periods. This experienced goalkeeper stopped SKA in the third series of the Army Super Series (2: 1), and today he made several brilliant saves, having coped with the SKA captain of Captain Yashkin and Gusev’s stopwatches. The last of them still hit the goalkeeper, but it was a prestigious goal.
Three times in the third period, the guests replaced the goalkeeper with a field player and pushed the Muscovites to the gate. Once Sharychenkov stopped the drive on the tape and got into the network. The referees’ trip to the “cinema” did not make them count the goal. Unlike the CSKA – Spartak home derby, in which the referee saw the puck, along with goalkeeper Reideborn’s trap, end up in the goal.
When the guests forced Sharychenkov to capitulate twice, another derby came to mind: a distant one against Oleg Znarok’s Dynamo during the NHL lockout. In December 2012, the red and blue in his palace on Leningradsky Prospekt burned hopelessly 0: 5 before the third period. In the third period, the hosts hit the gate of Sharychenkov four times in a row, then a Dynamo player (the initiative went to the magnificent Datsyuk), but they let Ovechkin into empty possessions – 4: 6. Soon, the head coach of CSKA, Valery Bragin, was fired.
Photo source: HC CSKA
But back to the CSKA Arena. After the final siren, Rotenberg said his team brought their own goals. They have name, surname and patronymic. Not all those who returned to the squad justified their confidence. There are questions to the leaders that those parties should take out.
The guests surpassed the champions in shots, confrontations, puck control, blocks. And they lost (up to five times) in penalty minutes, 2 against 10.
However, in the end, the judges spared the SKA defender Nikishin, who caught the striker Okulov with his hands on the clean ice.
Congratulations to CSKA captain Nesterov, who opened the scoring with a deft drive into the near corner late in the first half. He became the club’s highest scoring defender in the KHL with 33 goals, a small achievement.
Before the end of the regular season, the army team only has to meet on January 25 in St. Petersburg. It is essential for the leaders to take revenge and level the score in the 22/23 Super Series, which may well continue in the playoffs.
Rotebnerg noted that when his team plays disciplined and consistent, it is like no other. Champions are unlikely to agree with this conclusion.
KHL. Regular Championship.
CSKA (Moscow) – SKA (Saint Petersburg) – 4:2 (1:0, 2:0, 1:2)
Goals:
1:0 – Nesterov, 18:26
2:0 – Mingachev, 26:34
3:0-Sorkin, 38:44
3:1 – Gusev, 47:48
4:1 – Plotnikov, 49:03
4:2 – Pedan, 50:42
