The Russian national team suffered a loss before the start of the European Football Championship. Midfielder Andrei Mostovoy will miss the tournament due to a positive test for coronavirus. Instead, the coaching staff of the national team included defender Roman Evgeniev in the application.
Zenit midfielder Andrei Mostovoy will not be able to play for the Russian national team at the European Championship. On the eve of the group stage match with the Belgians, it became known that the player’s second test for coronavirus was also positive. After the first PCR testing, there were still doubts about the correctness of its result, because Mostovoy had already suffered from COVID, and therefore, he should have developed antibodies. But now participation in the tournament of the 23-year-old player, unfortunately, is excluded due to the need to go to at least two weeks of quarantine.
The Russian Football Union announced that Mostovoy will be replaced by Roman Evgeniev. “In connection with the unfavorable result of PCR testing of Andrey Mostovoy, the coaching staff decided to include defender Roman Evgeniev in the application for the tournament instead of him,” says the official Telegram channel of the Russian national team.
True, the Dynamo defender can hardly be called an equivalent replacement for the out-of-action Mostovoy, who has a completely different, attacking functionality.
Theoretically, the head coach of the team, Stanislav Cherchesov, could have called someone from the reserve list for help. Recall that there are three midfielders in it – Yuri Gazinsky, Daniil Lesovoy and Reziuan Mirzov. But the choice still fell on Evgeniev, who passed all the preparatory camps.
Football player Roman Evgeniev
Photo: Vladimir Song / RIA Novosti
In addition, apparently, the situation with defender Fedor Kudryashov, who was recently injured, was taken into account. It is still not clear whether he will help the national team at Euro. Although, most likely, Evgeniev will appear on the field only in the event of some kind of force majeure. Even in the absence of Kudryashov, he will have very few chances to break into the squad.
As for Mostovoy, this is not a critical, but still a loss for the Russian national team. Obviously, Cherchesov counted on him as a player in the next rotation, coming out on a substitute during the match. In particular, Mostovoy did a good job in the last control meeting with the Bulgarians. The mobile midfielder added speed to the team and was very noticeable in the end, when the Russians put the squeeze on the opponent and won – 1: 0.
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