Champions League in priority: why the match with “Rostov” for CSKA is more important than the derby with “Spartak”

On Wednesday, March 4, CSKA suffered a severe defeat from Spartak in the Russian Cup, and on Monday he will have to hold one of the most important matches of the second part of the RPL season. The rivals of the wards of Viktor Goncharenko will be their direct competitors in the fight for getting into the Champions League - the Rostov footballers.

The meeting with the yellow-blue is of paramount importance for the army. At the moment, teams are sharing third place in the standings of the championship of Russia, and the winner of the full-time duel will secure a solid advantage in the fight for a ticket to the main club tournament of the Old World. It is worth noting that in the next season the country will continue to be represented by three teams - two will start their performance from the group stage, and another one from the third qualifying round. Given the difficult financial condition of CSKA, it’s the entry into the Champions League, and not the victory in the national cup, which is his main task for the competition year.

Perhaps this is due to the fact that CSKA did not have Alan Dzagoev, Ivan Oblyakov, Hordur Magnusson and Arnor Sigurdsson at the base of the match with Spartak. All four spent more than 70 minutes in a meeting with Ural and could not be in good physical shape, as a result of which they received rest. Thus, their appearance at the start of the game with Rostov will be an additional confirmation of which tournament the red-blue leadership is betting on.

At the same time, the importance of the confrontation with Rostov is added by the fact that in the near future CSKA will have a series of difficult meetings. In the period from March 22 to April 12 he will play with Zenit, Dynamo and Spartak, and the success of the red-blue in the fight for medals directly depends on the result. In case of serious spectacle losses, the wards of Goncharenko risk falling down to fifth place and letting the competitors go ahead. A duel with the team of Valery Karpin will become for them a preparation for the stressful stage, and failure in it can become a harbinger of a fiasco.

Given the current form of wards Goncharenko, there is a possibility that they will not be able to take a single point in the confrontation with direct competitors. In this case, they will at least lose all chances for the Champions League even before reaching the finish line, and as a maximum they may even remain outside the European Cup zone. At the moment, their separation from the seventh Dynamo is eight points, but blue and white have a much less complicated calendar.

It should be noted that there are not so many prerequisites for the success of six-time Russian champions. Of course, the first two meetings can not make clear conclusions regarding the prospects of CSKA in the second part of the season, but so far they seem more than vague. The team was unable to secure a worthy gain in the winter transfer window, as a result of which many positions remained understaffed. First of all, we are talking about defense, the problems in which became clearly noticeable in the game with Spartak. The performance of the young Diveev and Karpov can not be called anything but a failure, and this taking into account the fact that the refereeing team decided not to assign a penalty for a hand game in the penalty area. Although later Igor still restored the status quo and slipped in the episode with the winning goal of Jordan Larsson.

It cannot be said that problems in the defense of the army became noticeable only now. As far back as last fall, fans and experts were surprised that it was the 17-year-old Karpov who was at the core of the team, and not the more experienced Zvonimir Charliya and Cedric Gogua. Subsequently, the Croat completely left Moscow, and the Ivorian was never able to earn the trust of the coach. However, the "small squad" did not receive a replenishment in this line, which resulted in a loss of points in the confrontation with Ural and a defeat from Spartak. It is worth noting that the game with Yekaterinburg could have been less successful, if the guests had better used their moments.

By and large, CSKA was not able to compensate for the loss of Rodrigo Bekao. With the departure of the Brazilian in Udinese, the team formed not only a qualitative, but also a quantitative shortage of performers in the defense center, which instantly led to a deterioration in results. Suffice it to say that a year ago the army team conceded 23 goals in 30 rounds, and now it has already 19 goals in its liabilities, although it has spent ten games less. At the same time, it’s extremely difficult to blame Goncharenko, because in terms of the level of defense representatives, the red-blue ones are inferior to almost all the top 5 RPL representatives.

Defense problems could have been less noticeable if not for a sudden attack on the attack line. First of all, this is due to the figure of Fedor Chalov. Last season, the young striker became the RPL top scorer and was considered as one of the main candidates for the Russian national team, but in this he seriously slowed down. Perhaps the reason for this was the failed transition to Crystal Palace, but for fans this can hardly be a serious consolation. As a result, a total of five goals in 20 matches.

By and large, the reason for the failures of red-blue lies in the fact that not one of the bright talents of the team was able to make significant progress compared to the previous year. Ilzat Akhmetov seriously handed over, Arnor Sigurdsson, Ivan Oblyakov and Christian Bistrovich remained at the same level, and Yaka Biyol could not become an analogue of Pontus Wernblum. In this situation, the burden of the leader was assumed by Nikola Vlašić, who became the club’s most expensive acquisition in recent years.

In the match against Spartak, all the danger came precisely from the Croatian midfielder, who managed to act as the organizer and the terminator of the attacks. But dependence on even such a high-class performer as Vlašić can hardly benefit any team. In the absence of support, Nicola was forced to do too much work and in the end looked noticeably tired.

Due to the presence of such serious problems, the acquisition of Ilya Shkurin can hardly be called a panacea. Yes, he did well on the field in the game with Spartak and showed that in the future he could sometimes replace Chalov in the starting lineup. Perhaps Fedor did not have enough respite to calmly think about the reasons for his failures and try to change something in his approach to business. But so far, Belarusians can hardly be called a quality gain and the future leader of the CSKA attack.

Thus, the wards of Goncharenko are suitable for meeting with yellow-blue if not in the status of outsiders, then at least not in the rank of obvious favorites. In addition to the above, this is evidenced by the fact that the match will be held at the Rostov Arena, as well as the result of the first game. Then the army team could not oppose anything vis-a-vis and were hard-beaten with a score of 1: 3.

In the five months since that meeting, Karpin’s squad certainly did not become weaker. The club managed to keep all its leaders, the sale of which was mentioned back in late autumn, and also strengthened by a couple of performers. So, the central defender Maxim Osipenko came from Tambov, and goalkeeper Maxim Rudakov from Zenit. And this is not counting Pavel Mamaev, who returned to football, who will try to be extremely useful in the game with the former team.