Dinamo Moscow arrived in Chelyabinsk in an unenviable emotional state. The series of the second round of the KHL playoffs with Traktor began for the regular season winner with two home defeats, which put Alexei Kudashov’s team on the brink. In the most unfavorable circumstances for the blue and white, their season could end next Friday, March 22. To do this, the Chelyabinsk team needed to get two wins at home.
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The second defeat in the Russian capital was especially painful for Dinamo. In the previous meeting, the Muscovites always managed to recover 0-1, 1-2 and even 2-4. In extra time they were able to defend themselves in a three-on-five format, but they still lost, conceding at the end of the first extra time with equal force. This loss was the Dynamo’s tenth in a row in the second round of the KHL playoffs.
The last time the capital club won in this phase of the Gagarin Cup was on March 18, 2021, when it beat SKA away from home. Since then, Dynamo has fallen into a catastrophic streak that it has not been able to break for several years: four consecutive defeats against SKA (2021), four consecutive defeats against CSKA (2022) and two consecutive defeats against Traktor (2024).
However, the blue and white composition changed so frequently during this time interval that all three series included only a very small group of players. One of them is Dynamo captain Andrei Mironov, for whom today’s match against Traktor became a historic event in his career. The 29-year-old hockey player is in his eleventh season with his native team, and his first game in Chelyabinsk was the 643rd of his league and club career. Thanks to this, the student of the Dinamo Sports School took clear first place in the history of Muscovites in the matches played in the national championships, surpassing the achievement of defender Sergei Vyshedkevich (642), who played his last match with the Club in 2010.
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The matches of the Moscow series turned out to be extremely bad personally for Dynamo goalkeeper Ilya Konovalov. The blue and white main goalkeeper was substituted twice in a row by Maxim Motorygin in both matches. It is not surprising that in the first match in Chelyabinsk the choice of the Muscovites’ coaching staff fell on the youngest goalkeeper. A change also affected the field hockey players: Egor Petukhov replaced Andrei Nikonov.
In turn, Traktor’s head coach Alexey Zavarukhin deviated from the well-known rule according to which the winning lineup does not change and made a change in his combinations. Sergey Kalinin returned to the Chelyabinsk team, replacing Nikita Soshnikov. The 33-year-old forward was installed in the fourth offensive line, receiving the captain’s letter.
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After the feast of offensive hockey and fireworks at the Moscow matches, it was quite reasonable to expect that the first match on Traktor’s home court would start completely differently. And so it happened. The first half of the first half unfolded so cautiously that deck chairs could have been placed in both goalkeepers’ goals. Just six minutes before the end of the period, visiting forward Dmitry Rashevsky sparked the game with a clumsy shot that hit the crossbar.
I woke up the game, but not Traktor. One of the main leaders of the Chelyabinsk team, Maxim Shabanov, is having an incredible playoffs and scored points in seven out of eight matches of the current Gagarin Cup. But at the end of the first half, the 23-year-old striker exceeded his freedom of action and made a serious mistake by cutting into his own zone, which the guests took advantage of: Nikita Gusev and Jordan Weal played the moment before the goal.
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The hosts immediately had an excellent chance to recover, having gained the majority after Brennan Menell was sent off. And it seemed to many Traktor fans that the happy event took place after Albert Yarullin’s shot and the subsequent slight rebound, but the puck treacherously hit the Dynamo goal. The teams went to half-time with a score of 1:1 in terms of goals and with a minimal advantage for the guests in terms of the main hockey indicator.
But already at the beginning of the second twenty minutes, everything changed radically. “Dynamo” failed miserably at the beginning of the period and very quickly conceded two goals: Anton Burdasov tied the score with his trademark shot with equal force, and then Semyon Der-Arguchintsev converted the majority on the second attempt, managing to put the home team ahead . .
Video rights belong to KHL LLC. You can watch the video on the official KHL website.
If Traktor had scored another goal at that time, Dynamo would have found it extremely difficult to get back into the game in the future. But the blue and white endured a difficult period, avoided the third missed goal and launched a strong counterattack. The main hero of the capital team in the first round of the playoffs, Artyom Ilyenko, received the puck on the right side, went to the center of the zone and with a strong blow to the wrist hit Zach Fucale, equalizing the position in the marker.
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Six minutes into the third period, Traktor took the lead again. Now the Chelyabinsk team launched a quick counterattack, Mikhail Kotlyarevsky dragged the puck into the visiting zone and threw it with his wrists near the far post from under the defender (3:2).
Video rights belong to KHL LLC. You can watch the video on the official KHL website.
The Muscovites could no longer recover. The majority obtained as a result of the dismissal of Kotlyarevsky himself also did not help. They suffered a third consecutive loss in the series with Traktor and are now one step away from finishing the season. The day after tomorrow, Zavarukhin’s team can participate in the semifinals of the Gagarin Cup. Dynamo’s terrible series of defeats in the second round of the KHL playoffs now totals 11 games.
