The first half saw the Moscow squad take the advantage, although there were few shots at Sergey Chernik’s net. Yuri Zhirkov passed along the left flank, sending the ball expertly into the far corner of the goalkeeper’s area. Chernik dived the wrong way and Alexander Kokorin sent the ball home. Sadly, our Belarusian squad failed to make any true attempts at Igor Akinfeev’s net, leaving the Russian goalie almost bored.
Even the efforts of most experienced footballer Alexander Hleb didn’t help the Belarusian national team
In the second half, coach Alexander Khatskevich was pleased to see the Belarusian squad take more initiative, scoring twice: Sergey Kislyak took a perfect penalty kick, from the corner. However, this inspired the Russians to go on the attack, sending three goals into Alexander Gutor’s net. During the 77th minute, Russian national team novice Alexey Golovin used a position error by the Belarusian defenders to punch through the left lower corner, resulting in another goal. Within six minutes, Russia’s Alexey Miranchuk had also scored: precisely into the centre of the net. Russian national team veteran Alexander Kerzhakov had the last word, scoring the fourth goal for his team and leaving the final score a 4:2.
For both teams, the meeting was a dress rehearsal for the next qualifying matches of the Europe-2016 championship. On Sunday, June 14th, the Russians will host the Austrian national team, in Moscow, while Belarus will face current champions Spain at Borisov Arena.
By Yegor Glebov
