Raging «KOS-Sintez» crushed another opponent

Two crushing victories as revenge

The aftertaste of the matches from the previous round in Volgograd was so strong in the Kazan team that it was scary for the next opponent. The Moscow players from the first team of MK SSHOR «Vostok» fell under the wrath of our water polo players. The opponent is quite serious, occupying the fourth place in the standings, although this season they are going through a generational change. However, the team has a fighting composition, and in the first half of the opening match, the Muscovites put up a fierce resistance, losing minimally in each of the two periods with a score of 3:4, totaling 6:8.

But from the third period, the resistance of the Muscovites was broken after the 8-minute period was won with a score of 5:0. The superiority of the Kazan duo of posts, Sergey Lisunov and Nikita Derevyankin, over the Moscow tandem of Vladislav Egorov and Zamir Mirziev was objectively felt. Derevyankin made a penta-trick, Lisunov scored a hat-trick; together they scored eight goals, proving to be head and shoulders above the defenders of the Moscow team.

Even in the previous confrontation with the Volgograd duo of Mikhail Rudoy and Vladimir Nezhinsky, there was no such superiority, and it is a bit disappointing. The thing is that 28-year-old Egorov and 23-year-old Mirziev, as graduates of the Kazan water polo school, are on the radar of the coaching staff, and one of them may replace 39-year-old captain of «KOS-Sintez» Sergey Lisunov.

And the new coaching staff of the Russian national team, which will most likely be headed by Serb Dejan Stanojević, is now doubly attentive in considering candidates for the first international start. It is unlikely that they will consider Lisunov for the long term, just like Nezhinsky or 36-year-old St. Petersburg player Igor Pliskevich. Andrey Balakirev from Astrakhan, who is approaching his 30th birthday, and, apparently, 32-year-old Derevyankin, who is in first place on the list of top scorers. Although he scored the lion's share of his goals against the youth team of St. Petersburg, this also needs to be taken into account.

Alas, the goalkeeper of the Moscow team, Nikita Gudovany, cannot record the matches as a success. Since 17-year-old Andrey Rimashevsky was sitting on the bench for the Muscovites, MK SSHOR «Vostok» did not have the option of changing goalkeepers to strengthen the game. Only four minutes before the end of the first match was there a substitution, after which the Kazan team stopped tormenting the Moscow goal, scoring only from the penalty spot against Rimashevsky. For the most part, Gudovany had to drink the bitterness of defeat to the dregs, having conceded 35 goals in two matches. Yevgeny Yaroshchuk was more versatile in this regard, replacing Igor Chirkov after the first half of the opening match with a score of 8:6, and from the second half, Yevgeny Kostrov defended the goal.

Why such treatment for the Muscovites?

There is no particular point in describing the course of the second half of the opening match between Kazan and Moscow. The scores were 11:1, 5:0 in the third 8-minute period, and 6:1 in the final period. And yet, in addition to Egorov and Mirziev, the Moscow team also had two graduates of the Kazan school — Adel Giniyatov and Daniil Ivanov, and the second coach, Alexander Boyko, should have been on the coaching bridge, but he was not visible in Kazan this time.

After sleeping on such a crushing defeat — 7:19, the Muscovites came out for the second match to fight to the end, putting all their strength into trying to take revenge. And the first period again ended in a draw with a score of 4:4. Such a number and variety of goals was a kind of thank you to the spectators who made it to the «Kazanorgsintez» swimming pool in freezing weather with the thermometer reading minus 25 degrees.

Having rewarded the Kazan spectators with a variety of goals, at the beginning of the second period, the Sintez players slightly sweetened the bitterness of failure for Gudovany when Nikolai Lazarev failed to convert a penalty. After that, they started playing for their own pleasure. Emil Zinnurov's scoring shot began the steady movement of the Kazan team towards its second consecutive and again crushing victory.

The second period was won with a score of 6:0, the third — 4:1, which the Moscow player Matvey Ryabov could not stand, receiving a straight red card. By the way, only this episode of the game made us remember the refereeing team, which consisted of Oleg Beloshnichenko from Rostov-on-Don, who returned to the refereeing platform after some time, and Sevastopolian Leonid Semko.

Regarding the latter, it should be said that his water polo career took place during the Ukrainian championship, as did that of his son Ilya Semko. But Ilya Semko's coaching career and Lev Semko's (Ilya Leonidovich's son and Leonid Stanislavovich's grandson) water polo career take place within the framework of Russian championships. Thus, another water polo dynasty has joined Russian water polo, like the Moscow Drevaley dynasty, the Astrakhan Gerzanich dynasty, the Kazan-Novosibirsk Verevkin-Lisunov family, the Kazan Shepelev family, and others.

In the wake of the confrontation with Volgograd

The second half of the second match was no longer so productive, as the Sintez players felt rehabilitated for the disappointing mistakes in Volgograd. The final score of 17:9 itself reflected an almost twofold advantage over the Muscovites who got the short end of the stick.

On the other hand, in Astrakhan, the local Dinamo team was twice stronger than Volgograd «Spartak», beating them with scores of 11:10 and 12:8. Only in the first of the two matches were the guests close to victory, but after losing 1:4 in the final period, they could not even earn a point.

In general, the entire refereeing performance of Abdrizyakov and Karuzin at the end of the two Volgograd matches was inexplicable. The decision made by the championship directorate after reviewing the video replay of the disputed moment in the second match «Spartak-Volgograd» — «KOS-Sintez» (12:11) means that the goal by Kazan player Ivan Vasiliev is recognized as valid, and the result of the match is changed to a draw — 12:12. To determine the winner of the championship, a series of five-meter throws will be held in February as part of the response match day. With all the complex of unforced mistakes made by the Sintez players during the matches, the weak performance of the goalkeepers, and the poor conversion of penalties, which also has to be acknowledged, the final aftertaste of that confrontation will be the refereeing errors.

This is already the second match involving Kazan and Volgograd in Karuzin's refereeing career that ends in a scandal. In 2019, the president of the Kazan club, Irek Zinnurov, was outraged by the course of the second match between these teams, which ended with a fight right in the water. At that time, Karuzin's partner was referee Sergey Naumov, who is also a commentator for the «Match TV» channel, which is why that incident was discussed in federal media. Now, by the way, there is complete calm in the press, although the situation in Volgograd was out of the ordinary, especially from a historical perspective.

From the 2019 lineup, Volgograd still has Vasily Eskov and Mikhail Ivankov, Mikhail Ruday, Timur Shaykhutdinov, and the entire coaching staff; Kazan still has Arslan Zakirov, Emil Zinnurov, Artem Odintsov, Igor Chirkov, and Arthur Fatautdinov, who moved from the team roster to the coaching staff. Two players at that time, Volgograd's Konstantin Kiselev and Kazan's Vladimir Nezhinsky, changed the location of the teams. Curiously, the majority of Kazan participants in the current events — Kostrov, Lazarev, Latypov, Lisunov, and Shepelev — defended the colors of Moscow Dinamo, which has faded into oblivion, in the championship of that year. In other words, it's not about any specific personalities in the water, but about the principled nature of the confrontation between Kazan and Volgograd, which began half a century ago. Therefore, the most experienced referees in the country should officiate these matches, the next of which will take place at the end of February in Kazan.

For comparison: at the recently concluded European Championship in Serbia, there were many heated confrontations, one of which (between the hosts of the championship and the Spanish national team) was memorable for the mutual removals of Mandich and Granados. But after the match, its witnesses spoke and wrote about the high level of confrontation, not about the referees who let the game slip out of their hands.