Dungeon and "Dragons": "Vanguard" closes the East, "Shanghai" conquers the West
The next week of the KHL regular season turned out to be rich in events and unexpected results. After Andrey Razin's departure, Metallurg's leader trusted Konstantin Shafranov, who had not previously worked as a head coach in the league. Avtomobilist reinforced the coaching staff with Mike Pelino and scored the first strong-willed victory of the season, breaking CSKA's impressive streak. Traktor is gradually finding its game under the leadership of Scott Gordon, but still has problems with the implementation of moments. Meanwhile, Avangard is going through a protracted crisis, and the Dragons, after four consecutive wins, have consolidated their position in the top three of their conference.
Shafranov became the head of Metallurg
After Andrey Razin's departure, Metallurg faced a difficult choice. There are few available specialists with a comparable status on the market, so the appointment of Konstantin Shafranov seems quite understandable. Moreover, the debut of the new head coach turned out to be successful — Magnitogorsk defeated Siberia (5:1).
At the same time, the main question to Shafranov has not disappeared. The team was built for Razin for several seasons, got used to his requirements and specific attacking hockey. Therefore, a drastic restructuring now would rather create additional risks. It would be more logical to keep the basic principles that allowed Metallurg to lead the championship, and gradually add their own ideas.
For Shafranov himself, this is a new level of responsibility. In the KHL, he earned a strong reputation as an assistant, primarily an offensive specialist and most, but he had not worked as a head coach before. Now he will have to be responsible not for a single component, but for the entire system: squad management, role allocation, reaction to the course of matches and decisions under pressure.
Therefore, it is too early to draw conclusions about Metallurg's cup prospects. The potential of the team remains high, but only the coming months will show how painless the transition from Razin to Shafranov will be.
But the failed return of Shafranov did not exactly help Ak Bars. The Kazan majority is already one of the problematic components of the team's game, and a specialist of this profile could significantly help the staff.
Pelino entered Kudashov's headquarters
Mike Pelino's invitation to Avtomobilist looks logical against the background of the team's problems in attack and majority. Yekaterinburg has a serious selection of performers, but so far they do not always turn this advantage into goals and stable results.
This is not the first time Pelino has joined the team during the season. In the last championship, he joined the Lokomotiv headquarters, where he worked with the attacking component. In the playoffs, Yaroslavl scored several important goals in the majority, although it would be too easy to directly link the progress of the special teams with only one coach.
There is another factor. Pelino is an experienced specialist with a rather calm manner of communication. In the headquarters of the demanding Alexei Kudashov, such a figure can be useful not only from a tactical point of view. With an uneven start and high expectations around Avtomobilist, an additional balance within the coaching staff definitely won't hurt.
The first strong-willed victory of the "Motorist"
The victory over CSKA Moscow (5:1) was the first for Avtomobilist in the season in a match during which the team lost in the score. The fact itself is significant: before that, even a minimal lag often became a serious problem for Yekaterinburg residents.
Part of the reason is the peculiarities of Kudashov's team's game. The "motorist" does not always dramatically increase the intensity of pressure when he finds himself in the role of catching up, so rivals often manage to defend the advantage quite comfortably. Even more worrisome is that the Uralians too often allow their opponents to open an account.
At the same time, the attacking potential of the team is obvious. The arrival of defenders capable of supporting the offense has added variety to positional attacks, and the fast transitions that were Avtomobilist's strong point in previous seasons have also been preserved. First of all, there is a lack of stability at the final stage.
Under Nikolai Zavarukhin, the team often brought combinations to a convenient throw and used the skills of their leaders more effectively. Now the implementation looks less convincing. This is probably the first thing Pelino will have to work with.
At the same time, it is too early to associate the victory over CSKA with his appearance: the Canadian specialist has not yet managed to arrive at the team's location by this match.
There are other issues. For example, the high pressure of CSKA in some segments caused the hosts serious problems. This means that the work on getting out from under pressure also remains relevant.
The Avangard crisis
The start of the season for Avangard is much worse than expected. Omsk remains in last place in the Eastern Conference with 16 points, although the team must solve completely different tasks in terms of player selection and financial capabilities.
The main problem is implementation. Avangard does not miss catastrophically much, but he scores noticeably less than one would expect from such a squad. The percentage of shots made dropped to 6.26, which is one of the worst figures in the league.
The problem already looks systemic. Omsk players are able to make strong stretches, create positional attacks and get good chances, but they too rarely turn a game advantage into a result. Sometimes the last solution is missing, sometimes the quality of the throw or the movement on the nickel is missing.
The reasons are probably complex, and Guy Boucher's staff will have to look for them. But one thing is clear: for a team with such ambitions, the current situation can already be called a crisis. The only question is how quickly Avangard will get out of it.
CSKA broke the winning streak
After losing to Spartak (0:2), which ended CSKA's 12-match winning streak, Igor Nikitin said that now he was interested in seeing the team's reaction.
— We already know how the team reacts to wins. Now I wonder how we will react to the defeat," the coach said at a press conference.
The first response was unsuccessful. In Yekaterinburg, the Army team started the match well, but then noticeably lost to Avtomobilist in the second and third periods.
With the first goal conceded, CSKA allowed the opponent to gain a foothold in the zone for a long time and lost concentration on the nickel. The second one appeared after a quick counterattack and connecting the defender with a second tempo. The army men have plenty of desire, but in several key episodes the team lacked composure and discipline.
As a result, CSKA suffered its second defeat in a row — 1:5. However, there was no prolonged decline: on Sunday, Nikitin's team beat SKA (3:1).
17-year-old Nazar Privalov scored the winning goal. For one of the most interesting students of the army system, this goal was the first in the KHL.
Traktor — coaching team
Traktor's standings remain difficult, but the team's performance itself looks better than its place in the table would suggest. In addition, Chelyabinsk has matches in reserve relative to some of its direct competitors.
Scott Gordon is gradually building a recognizable structure. Traktor has interesting combinations after winning face-offs, a well-organized way out from under pressure, and clear principles of positional attack and defense.
The problem is that the depth of the squad, especially in defense, limits the capabilities of the coaching staff. Some good tactical decisions just don't always get high-quality execution.
At the same time, the main issue of the team now is not even defense, but the realization of moments. In terms of goals conceded, Traktor is approximately in the middle of the upper part of the table, and remains among the worst teams in the league in terms of performance.
This is especially noticeable against the background of the offensive line, where there are plenty of experienced and highly paid players. Defender Grigory Dronov remains the team's top scorer, while Ivan Vydrenkov is ahead of some forwards in terms of performance, from whom much more was expected in the summer.
The arrival of Andrey Chivilev should add options in the center of the attack. Therefore, it would be wrong to talk about the lack of an individual class. Rather, the question is how effectively the coaching staff can turn this class into a stable performance.
Shanghai's winning streak
Shanghai is having a strong October and has risen to the top 3 of the Western Conference after four consecutive wins. For Mitch Love's team, this is no longer just a lucky short stretch.
However, some structural problems have not disappeared. The composition of the "Dragons" turned out to be quite large, but not the most mobile. Therefore, in matches against fast opponents, Shanghai is periodically inferior in movement and does not always have time to impose a power struggle in the right areas.
Now the team has learned how to better compensate for this shortcoming. The Dragons carry out high-quality positional attacks, tightly protect the center of their zone and have sufficient individual skill to solve episodes at the expense of individual players.
This is what allows them to stay high in the table with a completely acceptable balance of dropped and missed goals.
The main question is how stable this model will be over a long distance. In previous seasons, the team, which still played under the name Kunlun Red Star, often lacked stability, discipline and the same involvement of players throughout the championship.
If Love manages to avoid these problems and maintain the current level of organization, it will be a serious coaching achievement.
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