SKA have not impressed at the start of the season. Second consecutive defeat and we talk about refereeing
Rodion Vlasov September 8, 2023, 22:40 Moscow time Audio version: Your browser does not support the audio element.
Last year, Roman Rotenberg’s team suffered a second defeat on November 8.
Last season, SKA suffered two defeats in early November. Now the most dominant team of the last regular season received two “flyers” already at the end of the first week of the season, and both should be as offensive as possible for the St. Petersburg club. The first came from Torpedo, where there is obvious tension between Igor Larionov and Roman Rotenberg, the second came from Lokomotiv, which was SKA’s toughest rival last year.
The key moment of the match was two SKA penalties eight seconds apart midway through the second half. Roman Rotenberg, in a post-match comment, said that the judges admitted his mistake in the case of Maxim Fedotov’s expulsion. Lokomotiv also responded with a double: most of the pucks were only 30 seconds apart. The winning goal was scored by playmaker Denis Alekseev, who decided to go for the nickel: Johan Mattsson did not play well, who should not forget that goalkeeper mistakes are not forgiven in St. Petersburg.
Video rights belong to KHL LLC. You can see the video on the league’s official website.
SKA’s best player in attack was Alexander Nikishin, whose performance is clearly not going to decline compared to last year. Both goals came after powerful shots from him, but in the first case, Mikhail Vorobyov corrected the puck, and in the second, Alexander himself scored.
Video rights belong to KHL LLC. You can see the video on the league’s official website.
Lokomotiv won four of six games against SKA in the last championship. The style played in St. Petersburg last year was partially similar in basic settings to the hockey that Igor Nikitin previously preferred, but St. Petersburg had more creative and faster forwards. For most of the game, the Yaroslavl team did not allow SKA to turn on those “carousels” that we saw last fall, in two periods they surpassed them 28-16 – the statistics were equalized only at the end, when Loko calmed down a little. . It is interesting that in the last match Torpedo managed with a completely green defense.
It is clear that it is too early to shout “all is lost” after literally four games into the season, but so far there is a feeling that SKA has outdone itself. Last year’s newcomers joined the team instantly and Yashkin immediately started scoring goals. Now the team’s top offseason acquisition, Alex Galchenyuk, is back on the wing; This was also the case in the NHL, where Alex was dragged from center to wing and back. The Russian-American attack line with Tolchinsky and Khairullin had to be broken after the trio, at equal strength, scored two points from three in three games. The SKA attack early last year reminded me of the words “sturm und drang”; Now, in the end, the St. Petersburg team resorted to long-distance shots.
Well, SKA doesn’t know how to lose. This has a positive side: in St. Petersburg they are always ready to take out the goalkeeper, even in the most desperate situations, and this sometimes gives the audience fiery endings. But it’s hard to imagine Roman Rotenberg saying something like “I take all the blame” after the game. During the two defeats we heard twice about refereeing errors, as well as poor ice quality and stuck legs after constant flights (and the SKA has not yet flown beyond the Volga region). Losses are normal, especially in a marathon of 68 regular season games, but there is a feeling that the club’s brutal seriousness sometimes hits the players themselves.
It is clear that a team in which more than half of the squad has been renewed still needs to play well; So was it worth updating this half of the roster in the summer? The best is the enemy of the good and Peter hasn’t even received the best yet. In four games, SKA has only scored five goals on equal terms. Maybe it’s time to put Matvey Michkov in the spotlight before Philly fans start an Internet revolution?
