"On "Baltika" waves: "Zenit" is waiting for a difficult trip to Kaliningrad

The upcoming ninth round of the Russian Football Championship will be the last before a long pause for the national team games. ""All eight matches will be played over two days in the middle of the week, and the central one of them is the confrontation between Kaliningrad "Baltic" and St. Petersburg "Zenit".

"Baltika" — "Zenit"

The reigning national champion will come to visit the main sensation of last season. Both teams have their own game problems and show unstable results. "Zenit" has already lost three matches in the first eight rounds — Sergey Semak's team has not lost so many points in the opening segment of the championship for a long time. However, they won the other five meetings.

Therefore, although they are in fifth place, they are only five points behind the leading "Krasnodar". "Baltika" has already lost a lot of points with not the worst game. ""In particular, in the last two rounds, she stumbled on the teams from the bottom of the table — first there was a home defeat from the failed start of Moscow "Locomotive" (0:1), for which it was the first victory of the season, and then an away draw with the last Voronezh "Torch" (2:2), moreover, "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. The Kaliningraders escaped only at the end of the game.

""The match with Zenit" will be the last that "Baltika" will play without its head coach Andrey Talalaev. At the end of August, the RFU KDC suspended him for three games for making an insulting gesture towards the stands during a 1-1 meeting with "Rubin Kazan". All this time, Andrey Viktorovich was watching his team from the podium.

Kaliningrad is in seventh place and four points behind "Zenit". If they win, they can join the fight for medals. Let's remind that last season "Baltika" finished on the sixth line — the best result in the history of its performances in the RPL.

"Orenburg" — "Krasnodar"

The leading "Krasnodar" won the first six matches of the championship, but slowed down in the last two rounds. "Bulls" played a draw with teams from the Samara region. At first, we missed the victory over "Wings of the Soviets" (2:2), leading 2:0. And at the end of last week, only at the end of the home match with Tolyatti "Akron" equalized the score and avoided defeat (1:1).

But this has not yet prevented Krasnodar from maintaining the lead with a four-point margin from their closest pursuers. Now they are going to visit the unyielding "Orenburg". A little less than a year has passed since Ildar Akhmetzyanov, who previously worked for a long time in the First League at the head of FC KAMAZ from Naberezhnye Chelny, became the head coach of this team. One of the lowest-budget clubs under him was constantly at the top of the FNL table.

Flight cancellation: CSKA held a draw in the minority, "Dynamo" snatched victory in the end

"Krasnodar" lost points again, but avoided defeat, three Moscow clubs share the second place — the results of the eighth round of the Russian Premier League

In the RPL, the 42-year-old specialist made a strong middle-class player from "Orenburg", who in recent years has been constantly fighting for survival. Akhmetzyanov saved him from relegation last season, and now holds him in the middle of the table. However, the team is still having a hard time with the matches they have won. ""There is only one victory in the championship — in the first round over "Rostov", when "Orenburg" burned 0:1 in the end, but scored two goals in the last minutes and won 2-1.

After that, there was a home defeat against "Zenit" (0:3), and after that five draws in a row. The greatest success during this period can be considered the points taken away from "Spartak" Moscow (1:1), which is considered one of the favorites in the fight for gold. ""The unbeaten streak was interrupted only in the last round, when "Orenburg" in an away match against Moscow "Dynamo" almost did not keep the draw, conceding a goal in the last minutes (0:1).

"Rostov" — "Dynamo" (Moscow)

"Dynamo" did not start the championship very well, winning only one match in the first four rounds. But then Sandro Schwartz's team, albeit not with the best game, won four in a row. The strong-willed victory over "Spartak" in the Moscow derby (2:1) turned out to be especially significant.

Recent successes have helped the blue and white team to rise to second place. And now they are "Krasnodar's" main pursuers. They will have to confirm this status following the results of the next trip to "Rostov". Over the past year and a half, the Donskoy club has experienced the departure of long-term management and coaches, as well as key players. The Spanish head coach Jonathan Alba, who remained from previous times (he had previously assisted Valery Karpin for "Rostov" for many years and still assists in the Russian national team), quite confidently kept the team in the RPL last season.

This season, Rostov residents have won only two victories and are in 12th place. Below that, there is only the transition zone (two points away from it) and the direct relegation zone (four points away). ""To avoid a difficult struggle for survival, it is advisable for the yellow-blues to try to beat "Dynamo", which, in turn, will try to continue the winning streak in order to get closer to "Krasnodar".

There will also be five more matches in the upcoming ninth round. """""Spartak" """" " " "Voronezh" "Fakel", Moscow "Rodina" will play at home with Kazan "Rubin", "Locomotive" awaits Samara "Wings of the Soviets", CSKA will have to travel to Makhachkala "Dynamo", and Grozny "Akhmat" — Tolyatti "Akron".

The pause in the championship will be from September 17 to October 9. At this time, the Russian national team will play friendly matches with Iran in Kazan on September 29, with Namibia in Yekaterinburg on October 3 and with Nigeria in Nizhny Novgorod on October 6.