For the winter break in the RPL «Spartak» went to second place, six points behind Zenit and one of the favorites for the Russian Cup. It seemed that Guillermo Abascal's team was ready to compete for at least one of the trophies of the season. But in the spring, the backlog from St. Petersburg in the championship has grown to 10 points, and now the “red-whites” crashed out of the Cup from the modest “Akron”. All this is the result of improper preparation.
Abaskal's lack of experience When people talk about the peculiarities of Russian football and the poor adaptation of foreigners to our realities, they rarely remember one of the main problems — a very long winter break. Almost nowhere in Europe there is such a long pause even between seasons, and even more so in winter. And not all coaches know how to correctly bring their team to the resumption of the championship.
Abascal failed to do this either. A good coach, even without experience in holding long winter training camps, can correctly distribute the load and bring the players to peak shape by spring. But in the case of the Spaniard, apparently, the lack of the necessary experience affected, and there was no one to prompt the young coach. As a result, the players reached the peak of their capabilities much ahead of time.
The team looked very good at the RPL Winter Cup, having no difficulties against strong Krasnodar, Rostov and Sochi. The players easily moved around the field, played beautiful combinations, scored goals. But there were still two weeks before the resumption of the season, and when the time came for official matches, the team began to have difficulties.
In matches with Lokomotiv, the result was already given to Spartak very difficult. And then there was a complete failure: in nine matches of the Cup and the championship, the team won only two victories (over Fakel and Torpedo). In each match, the game was more and more difficult for the players, more and more mistakes became, more and more often the opponents punished the “red-whites”. In nine matches, Spartak conceded as many as 15 goals, although in the autumn its defense was one of the most reliable in the championship.
The reason for such a weak defense is also the poor readiness of the players. In the fall, Spartak played very intensively without the ball, practically not allowing the opponents to raise their heads. This allowed the team to compensate for the lack of an individual class. Now, due to mediocre physical form, the intensity has dropped, and defensive failures appear with alarming frequency. In attack, due to the level of performers and the built game, Spartak still looks formidable, but concedes too much to count on good results.
Injuries, transfers and lack of leaders In addition, the team was very affected by the absence of several leaders of the team. In some cases, these were objective difficulties. Alexander Selikhov, Alexander Sobolev and Shamar Nicholson, who received six-match disqualifications for the autumn fight in the game with Zenit, could not play in the Russian Cup matches. Quincy Promes did not prepare well for the season because he could not travel with the team to the training camp, and as a result he got injured. But the club could have avoided other difficulties.
The same Promes, who had undergone insufficient training, almost immediately began to play full matches. And it was his weak readiness, coupled with a heavy load, that led to his injury. Promesa team is very lacking in attack. Without him, Spartak also score a lot, but he made a difference, brought victories. Now this is a big problem.
Injuries to Georgiy Jikia, Daniil Khlusevich, Victor Mozes can also be the result of poor readiness of the players. Muscle damage usually occurs precisely because the body cannot cope with the proposed loads. But these are all the main players, and it is very difficult to replace them. And the absence of one of the leaders, even in one match, seriously affects the team, which is already in crisis.
Spartak also did not work very well on the transfer market. The bet was made on strengthening the defense line, the defenders Tomas Tavares and Alexis Duarte came to the team. But that didn't really improve the defense. Tavares looks good in attack, but is not impressive in defense, and Duarte immediately made a bunch of mistakes and loses the competition to Nikita Chernov and Pavel Maslov. spring cut. And if the club is still fighting for medals in the championship, then the team finished its way in the Cup, and ended ingloriously, flying first from Ural, and then from Akron. And this flight is absolutely on point. The «red-whites» buried themselves with their mistakes.
The opinion of the author may not coincide with the position of the editors.