Gross goalkeeper mistake and despotovich take
In the first match of the round, the Orenburg fighting for survival took the Arsenal in sixth place. And in this meeting, fortune took credit from Tula for a curious victory in Sochi a week ago. It is difficult to explain the strange mistake of goalkeeper Mikhail Levashov at the very beginning of the game. He calmly prepared to take the ball away from his goal, but did not notice George Despotovich, who was on the side, and allowed the striker to rob himself and hit an empty target.
And after the break, the Serb scored twice and brought the number of goals in the current RPL season to eight. In addition, the guests in the ending remained in the minority due to the removal of defender Robert Bauer. Thus, Orenburg won the first victory in the national championship in four months, while Arsenal, on the contrary, interrupted the three-match winning streak.
Dynamo victory over outsider and canceled goal
The first victory in the new year was won by Dynamo. After the defeat in the derby from Spartak, the blue-and-white houses beat Tambov with a minimum score. At the same time, the newcomer Nikolay Komlichenko became the author of the only goal.
A pupil of “Krasnodar” opened the score even in the opening of the meeting, but the judge after watching the replay canceled the goal because of a small offside. However, after only ten minutes, the striker scored a completely clean ball, taking advantage of the perfect supply of Konstantin Rausch.
Long VAR scan and two deletions
But Rubin, under the leadership of Leonid Slutsky, is still feeling unwell. In the previous round, Kazan did not manage to beat Tambov, and in this they lost to Wings of the Soviets in the home arena.
Judge Vladimir Moskalev came to the fore in this game. First, after watching the replay, he did not appoint a penalty kick to the home team for a hand game at Pablo Santos. Then canceled the goal of the Brazilian after filing from the standard position.
Finally, the referee from Voronezh immediately showed two red cards. At the end of the first half, the second “mustard plaster" for an imprudent tackle was received by Rubin midfielder Khvich Kvaratskhelia. And shortly before the final whistle, a similar punishment befell Anton Zinkovsky, and the compositions were equalized.
The fate of the confrontation was decided by a goal by Denis Popovich in the first half. An experienced Slovenian, who moved to the team in the winter, scored a goal in the second round in a row. At the same time, the productive transfer to him, as in the last round, was given by Dejan Radonic.
Sochi’s first victory since September and Zaika’s scoring goal
The closing Sochi standings managed to take advantage of the competitors' misfires and improve their position. Wards of Vladimir Fedotov beat Ural at home and interrupted the eight-match series without victories in the national championship.
The account was opened in the middle of the first half by Andrey Mostovoy. Midfielder finished off the ball in the net after an unsuccessful save by Yaroslav Godzur.
And in the second half of the meeting, a magnificent blow from outside the penalty area was noted by Cyril Zaika. It is noteworthy that the assist was given to him by Anton Zabolotny, who for the first time since the beginning of November received a place in the starting lineup. In the attack, he composed a duet with Alexander Kokorin, the latter this time dispensed with points for performance, although he was quite active.
Strange decision of Levnikov and save Guillerme
There were also enough controversial judgments in the match Lokomotiv - Akhmat. So, the referee Kirill Levnikov, who served the RPL game for the first time since July, canceled the goal of Grzegorz Krykhovyak because of a hand game, but did not see Ismael’s obvious hand and didn’t assign a penalty to the guests.
By that time, the hosts were already leading thanks to the exact blow of Eder. The Portuguese calmly struck the bottom into the far corner after the perfect transfer of Alexei Miranchuk.
But in the end, the railroad almost missed the victory. Marinato Guillerme imprudently ran out of the gate and joined in the struggle of Solomon Querquelia and Felipe Viseu. As a result, the goalkeeper allowed the Brazilian to circumvent himself. The striker hit the crossbar, and on finishing Kverkvelia had to play with his hand. Levnikov regarded this as a foul of last hope and showed the Georgian a red card. But Guilherme corrected himself for a gross mistake and fended off Viseu’s blow from the “point”.
Three penalties and goal of Mamaev
And in the fight between CSKA and “Rostov” goalkeepers completely repelled two penalties at once. However, the match as a whole turned out to be eventful and became a real decoration of the tour.
Already in the 21st minute, the army team were in the minority after the removal of Ilzat Akhmetov, but Roman Eremenko was not able to realize the penalty spot and upset the former club. Red-blue immediately punished the opponent for extravagance and opened an account in a counterattack. But the hosts quickly recouped thanks to the exact blow of the same Eremenko.
And at the beginning of the second half, the guests completely remained eight. Vadim Karpov received a rather controversial red card. This time Ivelin Popov came up to the point and did not miss. A few minutes later, another significant event occurred. For the first time in a year and a half, Pavel Mamaev entered the field in an official match. Moreover, the first shot of the midfielder was effective. Ricochet helped him upset the former team.
It seemed that CSKA did not have a chance to escape, but in the end Valery Karpin’s wards did everything to allow the army team to perform a miracle. First, Maxim Osipenko ferried the ball into his own goal, and then Alexander Saplinov violated the rules in his own penalty box.
But this time it was Sergei Pesyakov's turn to reflect the penalty. He fended off Fyodor Chalov’s shot and helped his team keep the victory in the “valid” match.
Ari's winning goal and Zobnin's removal
They managed to score three points for Krasnodar, which was in second place. Moreover, the southerners on the road outplayed the Spartak, which had gained an excellent move. The red and white did not have enough strength for all 90 minutes after the hardest quarter-final match of the Russian Cup with CSKA.
The fate of the confrontation was decided by Ari penalty in the middle of the second half. True, the hosts after the final whistle noted that the judge should have seen a repeat of the episode with the ill-fated foul of Ilya Kutepov on Marcus Berg. However, the referee could well have put the eleven-meter into the red-white goal at the beginning of the meeting, when the same Kutepov in the penalty area hit the opponent in the face, but Muscovites avoided trouble. But already in stoppage time, the judge showed the second yellow card to Roman Zobnin.
Thus, Krasnodar won the second consecutive victory in the RPL and re-beat Spartak this season.
Belenov’s hundredth match for zero and 61 assists from the Zenit flank
Southerners managed to reduce the gap from Zenit to six points, since the leader of the home championship did not manage to print the gates of Ufa. We add that Petersburgers were left without goals in the second round in a row. Moreover, even Artyom Dziuba who returned to duty did not help them.
The hosts owned the ball 65% of the playing time, delivered 14 shots, but everything was in vain, although sometimes the shell went almost on the “ribbon” of someone else's goal. Most often, Sergei Semak's wards sent the ball to someone else's penalty box on horseback. The team scored 61 such programs in 90 minutes.
But Alexander Belenov saved his possessions. By the way, this “dry” match became the hundredth for him in his career, he joined the symbolic club of Lev Yashin.