Athletistic/Football. On March 21, the Russian national team played its first match in 2024. The team met with Serbia. The Russians in Moscow beat their opponent with a score of 4:0. The home team was as strong as it could be.

This time Valery Georgievich collected the best, among whom Anton Miranchuk, Ivan Oblyakov and Konstantin Tyukavin quite unexpectedly appeared as the main team. The defense consisted of Khlusevich, Osipenko, Silyanov and Volkov. Experimentally. The Serbs, moreover, started two players from CSKA at once: Gajic and Zdelar and Erakovic from Zenit. Among the stars, they were accompanied by Jovic, Lukic and Tadic. But Milinkovic-Savic and Mitrovic remained in reserve.

The Serbs had the first dangerous moment at their disposal. They got it from Sergei Volkov’s legs. A terrible back pass turned into an interception and the ball was given to Zivkovic, who had time to trample the surface line. Finally, Andria pulled dangerously, turning a few centimeters to the left of the “nine”. Another ten minutes passed and the Russian team’s first significant attack became the defining episode. Khlusevich, after Golovin’s pass, fell to the goalkeeper and even managed to shoot Petrovich, but before that he was caught by Gayich. The referee waited for the video assistant’s prompt, after which he recorded a foul, issued Milan a red card and awarded a penalty. Anton Miranchuk shot into the top corner from 11 meters, Petrovich touched the ball, but failed to prevent the goal – 1:0.

10 minutes pass and something important happens again. Golovin crosses from a set piece, Tyukavin throws the ball closer to the center with the back of his head and Osipenko shoots at the goalkeeper – 2:0. Then Alexey Miranchuk scored – 3:0. After the third goal, the pace of the match slowed down again. The Russians did not seek to finish off their adversaries, the Serbs did not have the strength to return.

Russia ended this match in stoppage time. Ivan Sergeev hit the opponent’s goal. This time Arsen Zakharyan came from the flank and scored an assist, the striker scored in a tackle – 4:0.

After the match, former footballer Alexander Bubnov sharply criticized the guests, saying that the Serbs were worthless.

“The Serbs made a bad impression on me. Yes, some leaders didn’t show up, but with the existing team they could have played better. Russia, for them, is not an irritant at all, they don’t Didn’t play hard. What did they think they would win easily?

We can assume that they did not expect such a match from our players: in the second half they completely stopped playing. There simply wasn’t any. In terms of returns, even Cameroon looked better, but anyway, these are Serbia’s problems,” Bubnov said.

The Serbian media’s reaction to the crushing defeat by Russia was also very harsh. Nobody expected such a result.

“It was great and fabulous on the pitch,” writes the Novosti portal. “The hosts offered a real spectacle of the match: with a cultural and artistic program, numerous pyrotechnics.

Russia deservedly won, but it was of course unfortunate that Serbia had to play with ten men for over 70 minutes – this match would certainly have been more interesting at even strength. But the lesson must be learned: in modern football, any inattention has a price.”

“Serbia will not remember fondly the first of four warm-up matches for the European Championship in Germany,” writes Sportal.rs about this match. “Although in such matches the result is not in the foreground, an unconditional defeat (and it could have been worse) will definitely not please Dragan Stojkovic’s team.

Soccer Sportal writes that Serbia gave the initiative to the home team from the start. “It was a cruel lesson in Russian,” the document says.

Very soon the Russian national team will play another friendly match. On March 25 in Moscow, Valery Karpin’s team will face Paraguay.

Andrey Andreev, Sport.Ru



Athletistic