On Friday, it was officially announced that on November 17 the Russian national football team will meet with Tajikistan in Dushanbe. tells in detail about the next rival of the team, Valery Karpin, especially since they did not intersect before.
Semin's career started in Tajikistan
Formally, Yuri Pavlovich began to work independently in 1982 in the «Kuban», where he completed his career as a player. The first experience for the future star of the coaching workshop turned out to be short and unsuccessful, but already six months later an invitation came from Pamir. The flagship of the Tajik football of the Soviet era was not going through the best period in the First League and could well go down in the class. Relegation meant a virtual disaster for both the club and for all football in the country, since the most valuable personnel would instantly disperse. The young coach Semin was not afraid of the challenge, because he understood that the result in such a situation is much more expensive than with a prosperous team.
Interestingly, in the debut match under the guidance of a new coach, «Pamir» met just with «Kuban» and won (2:1). The results soon went up, there was no talk of relegation, the team finished the season in a worthy 12th place. Semin laid the foundations of Pamir, which in 1988 without him will win the First League and reach the top, where the collapse of the USSR will be caught. But most importantly, during that period, the specialist for the first time showed himself as a skilled tactician, psychologist and strategist, instantly becoming one of the most promising coaches in the country. And when, a couple of years later, he raised Lokomotiv from the First League, no one doubted his talent.
Tajikistan has the closest ties with Lokomotiv
This is not only about Semin, although he definitely had a hand in this connection. Yuri Baturenko played for Pamir, whom he later invited to Lokomotiv, and then made an assistant in almost all of his teams. Or, for example, Rashid Rakhimov, who made his debut for the club from Dushanbe under Yuri Pavlovich. He was one of the many doubles that the young coach brought to the starting line and pretty much kick-started their careers. Rakhimov subsequently played in Lokomotiv, after which he began a coaching career and eventually became the head of the railway workers.
Gennady Cherevchenko also played with Semin, who became the legend of Pamir even before the arrival of the coach. In the 1990s, he was invited to train the youth team of Lokomotiv, and his son, Igor, was an iconic figure in the main team at the turn of the millennium, after which he began to train there.
But if we talk about Tajik football players in general, then there were not so many of them in the Russian championship. In total, there will be one and a half to two dozen names, not all of which have remained in the memory of the fans. Now in the RPL there will not be a single representative of the «Persian lions» at all. There is only 18-year-old Krasnodar midfielder Alijoni Aini, but he moved to Russia last summer and so far only plays for the second team.
Tajikistan is in the second hundred of the FIFA rankings
The future rival of the Russian national team can be attributed to football «dwarfs». The Persian Lions have never made it to the top 100 teams in the world. The best result was the 103rd place in July 2013, and now the team keeps about the same level (108). At the same time, next to the table are not so weak teams — New Zealand (105th), India (106th), Kosovo (107th), Estonia (109th) and Cyprus (110th). Although Russia's meetings with the latter in the selection of the 2022 World Cup clearly showed the difference in class with teams from the second hundred of the rating. Note that the previous rival of Karpin's wards — Kyrgyzstan — is several lines higher than Tajikistan (95th).
In 2023, Tajikistan will perform at the Asian Cup for the first time
The national team of Tajikistan has not yet achieved serious success at the international level. The “lions” can only dream of participating in the final stage of the World Cup. Qualification in Asia consists of several rounds. For seven attempts to overcome it, the rivals of the Russians have never gone beyond the first. There were completely failed campaigns — like before the 2018 World Cup, when Tajikistan won only one victory in 8 rounds. And in the last qualifying round for Qatar, the Lions came second after the favorite in the face of Japan, although they were 11 points behind the group leader and lost both meetings to him with a total score of 1:7. In any case, it is impossible for them to be among the four representatives of Asia entering the World Cup directly in the coming years.The results of Tajikistan on the continent are not particularly better. The Lions have been trying to compete in the Asian Cup since the 1996 tournament, but even then they failed to qualify. In the last cycle, they nevertheless achieved a historic exit to the final part, including due to the connection with the qualification of the 2018 World Cup. The national team of Tajikistan was only behind Lebanon in terms of additional indicators in the ranking of the best teams that took second places, and did not receive a direct ticket to the 2023 tournament in the same Qatar. But she did not leave the selection and in the next stage, thanks to the better difference between goals scored and conceded, she overtook Kyrgyzstan in the group.
The «lions» do not yet know their rivals in the final part of the Asian Cup, but it is obvious that there are few chances for a bright result. The Tajikistan national team was seeded in the fourth pot in the company with the lowest-ranked five teams, so the draw can be merciless. Be that as it may, the very trip to Qatar will already be a historic achievement for our future rival.
Tajikistan has its own «Zenith»
The local championship also has a hegemon, and it appeared much earlier than in Russia. In 2007, a new club appeared on the football map of Tajikistan in Dushanbe — Istiklol, which won the first champion title three years later. In subsequent seasons, the capital team became the strongest in the country nine more times, and since 2014 it has not given the first line to anyone at all. In most cases, Khujand tried to compete with him, which already has nine sets of silver medals, but not a single gold medal. This season, «Istiqlol» secured another title a few rounds before the finish line, breaking away from the pursuers by 11 points.Also, «Istiklol» took the Cup of Tajikistan eight times, and on Saturday it can do it again if it defeats «Kuktosh» in the final. Also, the club from Dushanbe has rich international experience due to regular participation in the Asian Champions League. In particular, last season the team for the first time in history reached the 1/8 finals of the tournament, where in a bitter struggle they lost to the Iranian Persepolis (0:1). True, in the last draw, «Istiklol» lost five out of six matches in the group and ingloriously retired.
The most expensive player of the national team of Tajikistan is estimated at 700 thousand euros
It is not surprising that the backbone of the «lions» are the players of the country's leading club. At the previous training camp in September, out of 23 players, 10 represented Istiklol, and half of them were in the starting lineup for the last match with Malaysia (0:0, 3:0 on penalties). Most football players play in the local championship, but there are also foreign players. Some play in neighboring countries — Uzbekistan or Iran, and only a few get to Europe. There is even a representative of Spanish football: 19-year-old Amadoni Kamolov, who plays for Paracuellos from the fifth league.
The level of individual skill and club affiliation of the collections is reflected in the transfer fee. Experts estimate the current composition of Tajikistan at 5.3 million euros — Zelimkhan Bakaev alone is worth a little less. Of the current squad, the highest price tag from transfermarkt.de went to central midfielder Ehson Panjshanbe — 700 thousand. Last summer, the 23-year-old midfielder moved to a fairly strong Iranian championship by Asian standards, he can be considered the most successful among partners. This is one of the most experienced players of the national team of Tajikistan (37 matches, 4 goals). «/
«Persian Lions» is trained by a foreigner
This is only the third such case in the history of the national team of Tajikistan. In the early 2010s, she had experience working with Bosnian Kemal Alispakhich and Serbian Nikola Kavazovic, and before the current coach, the team was led by Uzbek Usman Tashev. To replace him, the leadership of the federation invited the German Croat Petr Shegrt, who has rich experience in exotic teams. Previously, he managed to work with Afghanistan and the Maldives, and 15 years ago he worked as a scout and coach in the national team of Georgia. His resume also includes clubs from Indonesia. It is worth noting that Sjögrt is well versed in youth, since he spent many years of his career in the second teams. Due to the fact that many players progressed under his leadership, he even received the nickname «architect». , as practice has shown, is correct. Sjögrt took charge of the team at the beginning of the year and managed to play seven matches in which the Lions suffered only one defeat and won five victories. And most importantly, they overcame the qualifying tournament of the Asian Cup and will play in the finals for the first time next summer. Of course, this achievement only strengthened the position of the 56-year-old Croatian specialist.