’Around the Match Day’ is a new feature on RussianFootballNews.com. We will take a look at all the major and minor stories surrounding the match day and give you an overview you do not get elsewhere.
In the last round of the Russian Premier League Zenit St. Petersburg finally received the gold medals they secured long ago. Zenit celebrated the championship at home, when they won 1-0 at home against Lokomotiv Moscow. The league title is Zenit’s first since the 2011/2012 season, and it is also the first championship Axel Witsel and Hulk wins in Russia. After André Villas-Boas’ troops received their well-deserved medals a rather unusual team picture was released by the club.
“Zenit” Villas-Boas said about the 19th century style picture, “is one of those clubs who is tightly connected with the city and is literally intertwined with its life. That kind of a tight connection is an additional responsibility and motivation both for the club and its coach.”
While most people recognize Villas-Boas and the players, few people have noticed the portrait of Pavel Sadyrin on the wall. Sadyrin coached the Zenit team who won the 1984 Soviet title, which was Zenit’s first league title, as well as their only Soviet championship. The picture also shows Villas-Boas discussing tactics with Danny and Arshavin, while Kerzhakov and Rondon are in an intense conversation about how to score goals, as Zenit’s website explained the picture.
Before the last round Spartak Moscow and Murat Yakin finally announced that their cooperation would end when the season was over. According to the news this was a mutual agreement, but Yakin had for a long time been like a dead man walking. Even though Spartak managed some impressive victories against the local rivals from Dinamo and CSKA early in the season, they were also humiliated against smaller clubs just like they lost 4-0 at home against CSKA not long ago. The memories of the good start of the season, which featured victories against Rubin Kazan, CSKA and Dinamo is now long forgotten and replaced with the memories of defeats to Ufa, Arsenal Tula and of course CSKA.
Spartak were supposedly to pay Yakin an exorbitant compensation if they sacked him mid-season, which explains why they waited until the season was over. Even though Spartak finished 6th it is however worth noticing that Yakin managed to bring a lot of interesting young guys into the team, something the club might be grateful for in a year or two.
In the middle of the FIFA Crisis Russia’s president Vladimir Putin found time to talk about the country’s sporting situation. Putin made it clear that Russian sport ‘should not stew in its own juice’, but also that the country was in danger of destroying its development by bringing in too many foreign athletes and specialists, which could create problems for the national teams. This is highly relevant in the case of football, where there is an ongoing discussion on whether or not the Premier League should expand its limits on foreign players.
What else happened?
- Nikolai Tolstykh was fired as head of the Russian Football Union. His former deputy Nikita Simonyan is now in charge until the next election, where the current sports minister Vitaly Mutko is expected to take over.
- Kevin Kuranyi said goodbye to Dinamo Moscow’s fans.
An emotional Kevin Kuranyi said goodbye to Dinamo’s fans after the club drew with FC Krasnodar Saturday.
- Anzhi built a 25 meter long and 11 meter high Lamborghini statue outside of their stadium in celebration of their promotion to the RPL.
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