2013-14 Matchweek 26 Recap: 2-1 matches all around

First of all, my apologies for the very very late Matchweek Recap. It was meant to be posted on Tuesday or Wednesday, but circumstances prevented me from writing it until now (a matter of hours before Matchweek 27's first match starts). Secondly, Sunday saw several red cards as matches really got out of control.

Amkar 0-2 Ural
Amkar and Ural went toe to toe for most of the match, but when it came down to it, the hosts were far too profligate and the visitors were absolutely clinical. Edgar Manucharyan gave Ural the lead midway through the second half before Vladimir Khozin finished it off with seven minutes of regular time left to play.

Tomsk 2-0 Krylia
Tomsk were drastically better than Krylia, but relied on two goals in the space of three minutes in the first half (courtesy of Renat Sabitov and Jan Holenda) to go ahead, and then were happy to sit on their lead for the remaining hour of the match.

Lokomotiv 2-1 Terek
Ailton gave the visitors the lead after just half an hour, before the rarely-started Roman Pavlyuchenko scored a good brace in the space of nine minutes to give Lokomotiv a much tougher win than they expected.

Anzhi 1-2 Zenit
Zenit went ahead after nine minutes thanks to the in-form Salamon Rondon, but Fyodor Smolov pulled Anzhi level just before the half hour mark. However, it was Danny who got the last laugh, hitting home with thirty minutes left to play, although the result could have been far more comfortable for the league leaders.

Rubin 2-1 Spartak

Yura Movsisyan put Spartak ahead early in the second half, while Marko Devic pulled Rubin back onto level terms just eleven minutes later. Ultimately, it was Rubin's counter-attacking game that triumphed over Spartak's possession based system as Aleksandr Prudnikov scored in stoppage time to give Rubin the three points and continue Spartak's awful form.

Dynamo 1-2 Krasnodar
Dynamo took the lead through Aleksandr Kokorin, yet the dismissal of Aleksei Kozlov allowed Roman Shirokov and Ricardo Laborde to give Krasnodar a lead away from home. Laborde himself was dismissed in the final minute of regular time, but it was not enough for Dynamo to get the equaliser they desired.

Kuban 0-4 CSKA
CSKA went ahead through Steven Zuber late in the first half, before Kuban's Roman Bugaev got sent off in the last minute of the half and gave away a penalty, which Seydou Doumbia converted. Konstantin Bazelyuk, standing in for the suspended Alan Dzagoev, added the third in the second half, while Zoran Tosic finished the match off.

Volga 2-1 Rostov
Piotr Polczak scored for Volga within a minute and Artur Sarkisov added to Rostov's woes in the second half with a goal of his own. The visitors pushed hard to get back in the match, and Artem Dzyuba did eventually score, but it was too little too late.


Table:
1 - Zenit
2 - Lokomotiv
3 - CSKA
4 - Dynamo
5 - Spartak
6 - Krasnodar
7 - Amkar
8 - Rostov
9 - Kuban
10 - Rubin
11 - Ural
12 - Terek
13 - Krylia
14 - Tomsk
15 - Volga
16 - Anzhi