First home: all at the Premier Arena!
The first home match in the championship of Russia 2022-2023 Gazprom-Ugra will hold 9 October against Kemerovo "Kuzbass". The history of confrontation between our clubs is long and replete with various collisions. Us, eg, always nice to remember, how did we get around to 2017 the team of Thomas Sammelvuo in the fight for getting into the Final Six. But "Kuzbass" beat us in recent years, when the club confidently stepped into the elite of Russian volleyball, and Gazprom-Yugra, for objective reasons, slowed down.
But history is history, and we have a new battle on the agenda. Both clubs approach him with defeats in the first round of the PARI Superleague. We lost away to Belogorya, and Kuzbass quite unexpectedly lost at home to Fakel. It means, that in Surgut everyone will try to rehabilitate, and who will do it better is an open question.
The strengths of the current Kuzbass are a combination of experience (Shcherbakov, Markin, Tavasiev, Karpukhov, Rukavishnikov) and youth (Krechetov, Klets, Pakshin). And, the experience is quite functional, and youth is quite powerful and bright. "Gazprom-Ugra", basically, exists by the same formula, only the proportion we have this season is shifted in favor of experience, the functional state of which just may raise questions. In the match with "Belogorye", eg, Nikita Alekseev did not look his best, Yes, and there are objective difficulties in the replay.
But still, seems, the outcome of the match will be decided on another position, namely in the duel of binders. Egor Krechetov + well-known to us Evgeny Rukavishnikov vs Vadim Ozhiganov + Maxim Kirillov/Vsevolod Abramychev. Not everything looks perfect for both teams in this position, and from that, how much you can pick up "tails", will largely depend on the well-being of the attackers and, Consequently, game result.
If we sum up the personal ratings of the players, then Kuzbass looks more impressive, but such primitive mathematics, as we know, volleyball does not always work. Each game has a lot of different components and variables., which often occur right along the way.. Together with Alexei Samoylenko, a strong trio turned out, that the Surgutians will be able to find the necessary balance and show a well-coordinated collective smart game - in this case, we have good chances of success. Kuzbass is a formidable opponent, but not irresistible, that proved the same "Torch", who defeated the Kemerovo team away just due to a more concentrated game, plus the skill and personal charisma of a single Sergey Grankin (the same binding factor).
The opponent has probably already been taken to pieces by the coaching staff of the Surgut team, the players were left with such a "small", how to implement the plan on the site. And we have to remind, that the head coach of Kuzbass Alexei Babeshin began his coaching career just in Surgut, and Evgeny Rukavishnikov played for Gazprom-Ugra last season, so it’s unlikely that Kemerovo residents will be able to prepare any special surprises. But we'll still try! All, who missed big volleyball in Surgut - welcome to the Premier Arena on Sunday, 9 October, start of the match at 19 hours.
