“Spartak” – “Ural”: how will Guillermo Abascal’s team play the first official match in 2023?

Athletistic/ Football. RPL fans have been waiting. The second half of the season has started. In the 18th round, Spartak will host the Urals. The match will start on March 4 at 2:00 p.m. Moscow time.

Spartak – Urals

Les Rouge et Blanc have made a perfect start to the season. The club first won the RPL Winter Cup and then proved to be a quality side against Lokomotiv. Spartak scored five goals in two matches against the railway. Guillermo Abascal surprises not only with his well-built football, but also with his attitude towards young Russians. The coach in the first game fully set up the Russian team. At the same time, he got results. The legionaries were already involved in the second meeting. At the same time, there is a certain concern for defense. Defender Chernov is not the optimal partner for Jikia. Legionnaire Duarte was bought in his place, but the coach is not using an outsider yet. So far, there are no options in the starting line-up for second signing Tavares. Quincy Promes was able to prepare the season individually to the delight of the Reds-Whites fans. The player is clearly not in his best form. At the same time, individual skills are still sufficient to achieve a result at the RPL level. Of the injured players, only one major loss. The club will not be able to count on Nail Umyarov. The player was absent for a long time, an operation is possible. Ural is the most progressive RPL club at the moment. After the appointment of Viktor Goncharenko, the team made a breakthrough from the basement of the standings to tenth place. Overall, the departure from the Urals is no longer in danger. The reserve even from the thirteenth position is eight points. Ural showed that the breakthrough was not accidental. In 2023, the team managed to overtake Rostov in the Russian Cup. “Bumblebees” turned out to be a very well prepared team physically. We can say that this was a key advantage over Rostov. In addition, the Urals have potential thanks to the legionnaires. By RPL standards, a decent attacking group has been assembled. In the first round, striker Vloot did not fully show himself. A few years ago he was one of the strongest in the Dutch league. Now the striker has recovered from his injury. 25-year-old striker Rangelovic has potential. According to the cost of the transfer, the football player is the most expensive in the Urals. Now the Urals, both in composition and in play, are no strangers to the RPL. The team can climb a few lines higher in the Russian championship. Bookmakers against the background of the latest results expect open football. There are options here. Nevertheless, the Cup regulations favored such a scenario. In the Russian Championship, clubs will be more focused on defense, because the value of the result is higher. Ural is able to play well in defense. The destruction is not visible.

No less interesting will be the match in Rostov-on-Don, where Valery Karpin’s Rostov will meet Lokomotiv.

Rostov-Lokomotiv

The southerners are very disappointing in 2023. It is not clear how the team plans to progress. Rostov failed at the practice tournament. Then Valery Karpin attributed this to a large number of young players and the warm-up status of the event. In the matches of the Russian Cup against the Urals, no serious progress was noted. Rostov lost the deal to the Yekaterinburg club. Here, the coach has already mentioned the quality of the pitch. It is important that Rostov is one of the few clubs to enter the second half of the season without any line-up changes. In other words, there will certainly be no global progress, given that many football players have already played to the maximum of their own abilities. The situation is complicated by Komlichenko’s poor form. The main striker even remained in reserve for the second game with the Urals. So far, in terms of quality of play, Rostov best matches the clubs of the second ten. The overall situation is unlikely to change for the game against Lokomotiv. It is very difficult to note an advantage in Rostov. In the first round, the club was very lucky. Now it’s hard to rely on luck alone. At the same time, from the positive – the margin in the table. Rostov leads Dynamo in the fight for third place by six points. Lokomotiv, on the contrary, can become the most progressive team in the second half of the season. Railway workers have significantly updated the composition. The club proved worthy against Spartak in the Russian Cup. In addition to newcomers, namely Dzyuba, Pinyaev and Glushenkov, Lokomotiv has a bonus – the return of Anton Miranchuk. We feel that the midfielder can become the new leader of the club. It was exactly like that in the game against Spartak. Lokomotiv has a company that can compete for medals in the Russian championship by name and composition depth. At the same time, such tasks are no longer realistic. At the same time, a series of victories is envisaged to get out of the danger zone. The locomotive is seven points behind the coveted twelfth place. Bookmakers place Rostov as favorites for the next game. Nothing justifies such an arrangement. The odds are likely to change significantly a few days before the match. The locomotive looked much more confident in cup matches. Rostov actually does not have a single trump card. The pitch factor is not that important, as there will be few spectators in the stadium. Due to the difference in individual skill, the locomotive can easily claim victory. It is logical to assume that the Muscovites will not come out of this game without points.