Vadik Vassily - Welcome back, today I will be taking a look back on this past season that has seen us crowned Rosgosstrakh Chempionat Rossii and Kubok Rossii champions. There will also be some insight from manager Luke Hendricks on what he was thinking throughout the year.
Pre-Season
Transfers
Having finished the 2019/20 season in second place, many around the club were quietly optimistic about this season. With it being Luke’s second season in charge and the club moulding nicely into how he wanted it, some thought we may be able to challenge.
But it was clear we needed some additions in the transfer market.
Outgoing
The one big movement away from the club in the summer window was that of Hörður Björgvin Magnússon. The Icelandic center back joined now relegated Premier League club Crystal Palace in a deal worth £4,000,000. Since that move he has played just five games and is reportedly transfer listed having failed to impress in England.
Incoming
The incoming transfers mainly focused around the arrival of added depth with the likes of Sergiy Bolbat, Radovan Pankov, Matvey Safonov all being rotation pieces throughout the season. Initially Magomed-Shapi Suleimanov was used as a rotation option, however in the second half of the season, he impressed and saw a lot more gametime. Alexandr Zhuralvlev, Dias Shevchenko and Raphaël Anaba were all added as youngsters with a high level of potential for the future.
Pre-Season Results
Our pre-season friendlies were largely uneventful with the club going unbeaten in games that weren’t exactly challenging. Lucas Santos was the man to impress the most, scoring four goals in his four friendly games. The pre-season once again upset manager Luke Hendricks who claimed that not having half a squad at points throughout pre-season makes “no-sense” and “disrupts plans”.
Luke Hendricks:
“We needed to have more time with the players we felt. There was a lot of players missing which makes no-sense to me. The reason we have pre-season is to get the players together, by having a majority of those key players missing for whatever reason, it really disrupts our plans.”
Part 1 - June - December
Despite disrupted planning, as Luke put it, in the pre-season, CSKA got off to an excellent start in the new season. Kicking off the year with a 5-0 victory over Tambov, CSKA continued a winning streak lasting eight games, finally losing for the first time against Dynamo Moscow.
In that run the side scored twenty-four goals, conceding just four goals. The undoubted star of that run was Nikola Vlasic, who scored six goals during the run. The Croatian who had disappointed many the previous season was a continual force throughout the first period of the year scoring ten goals in sixteen games, an amount that saw him finish in the top ten of the league's goal scoring rankings.
The run was a massive “indication of what the side could do” according to Luke Hendricks.
Luke Hendricks :
“That run was huge. It gave us belief early on and it allowed us to set our expectations of the players high. It was a great indication of what the side could do and it was then down to us as a backroom team to ensure they could continue to do so. The players were fantastic throughout and played every game to their highest ability.”
In September we had the first of our Champions League games. Having been drawn in a very tough group, including Manchester City, who finished 2nd in the English Premier League, Inter Milan, who currently sit 3rd in the Serie A just three points behind Napoli in 1st with a game to play and Atlético Madrid who finished 3rd in LaLiga.
CSKA started the group with three losses, losing 2-0 to Manchester City, 3-1 away to Inter Milan and 3-1 away to Madrid. But a home victory over Atlético and a 1-0 win over Inter Milan, thanks to an excellent Ivan Oblyakov long range strike saw us finish 3rd in the group.
Back in September, we also witnessed our last loss in domestic competition with Lokomotiv Moscow beating us 2-1. After a tough month that saw us win just two games, not many were expecting the run we would then go on.
Back to back wins over Spartak Moscow and Zenit St. Petersburg saw us retake the lead at the top of the league, a position we wouldn’t give up for the final eighteen league games. The first half of the season also saw us feature in the Kubok Rossii. We started our campaign in the cup against local side Chertanovo Moscow, who we comfortably dispatched in a 5-0 win. We then beat Nizhniy Novgorod in the next round, 2-0, to set up a quarter-final match against Krasnodar.
Part 2 - January - May
Transfers
With a good first half to the season behind us, key players began attracting attention. Whilst management tried to keep the team together some had to go meaning we also saw some new additions to the team.
Outgoing
As Nikola Vlasic impressed in the first half of the season, he attracted numerous offers from across Europe. Dortmund, in Germany, were the first to make an offer for the attacking midfielder but they were quickly blown out of the water with offers from Real Madrid and Juventus for the talented playmaker. Vlasic eventually agreed a move with Italian side Juventus in a move worth £51,000,000. He has continued to impress in Italy, with seven goal contributions in fifteen games. Vlasic wasn’t a player Luke wanted to lose but he couldn’t “stand in the players' way” as he wanted the chance to “prove himself at the highest level”.
Luke Hendricks:
“Obviously Nikola wasn’t a player we wanted to lose, he’s an incredibly talented player who is still very young. But he wanted to leave and I couldn’t stand in his way. Nikola felt he missed his chance to impress on the biggest stage whilst at Everton so when two of Europe’s biggest teams came in for him he wanted to prove himself at the highest level. We got what we felt was a good deal and we wish him well for the future"
The other major outgoing player was Ilzat Akhmetov, who moved to the South coast of England to join Southampton. The midfielder, who has currently struggled to adapt to the English Premier League, joined the English side for £12,500,000 giving Luke a large amount of money to add to his side.
Incoming
However, Luke seemingly invested smartly instead of spending large sums of players, focusing on adding talented young players. Nikola Vlasic’s replacement came in the form of Matko Miljevic, with the Argentinian signing for £8,000,000. In his eleven league games so far, Matko scored four goals and showed glimpses of promise for the future.
Also joining was former Spanish under 21s captain Jesús Vallejo. The former Real Madrid defender’s contract was running out and that allowed CSKA to swoop in and get the now 24 year old on a cut price deal. Vallejo has shown his quality early on in his time at the club, winning a remarkable 90% of his tackles, whilst completing 88% of his passes.
The final arrival of the season was that of Alexandr Sobolev on deadline day, who arrived to add competition for places up front. With Fedor Chalov failing to score in ten games, Sobolev joined for a deal close to £10,000,000 but has proven his worth so far this season, despite having limited game time. In just six appearances, Sobolev scored in his first start and having only started one game since, he is expected to see much more game time in cup competitions next season.
Results February - May
The second half of the season started with back to back losses to Tottenham Hotspur in the Europa League First Knockout Round. Despite the losses, Luke Hendricks looks back with “pride”on the clubs European campaign.
Luke Hendricks:
“Yes, we failed to improve on last season's position but we played and impressed against much greater competition this season. Nobody, apart from the 3-0 defeat to Manchester City, dominated us and we managed to get two great victories against Atlético Madrid and Inter Milan. We made it hard for Spurs and I think we can look back on this campaign with pride”
Following those losses, CSKA won fourteen of their next fifteen competitive games, drawing the other one. It began with a 2-0 victory over Krasnodar with CSKA advancing into the Kubok Rossii semi-final.
Following a victory over Arsenal Tula, Rostov scraped a draw that seemingly inspired CSKA to the title. Since the Rostov game, CSKA failed to score more than once, just one time in a 1-0 victory over Krasnodar. The side saw goals flowing whilst defensively they were solid. In the final fifteen competitive games of the season, Luke Hendricks' team scored forty goals and conceded just seven.
The 2-1 victory over Lokomotiv Moscow at the end of April all but secured the league title for CSKA with just a point needed to confirm it. That point was secured the very next game, defeating Spartak Moscow 3-0, followed by a 4-0 win over Sochi, a 3-0 win over Zenit and a 4-1 win over Ural to end the league season.
May also saw the confirmation of the double as we beat Spartak for the second time in a month and once again by three goals. The 4-1 victory led by Fedor Chalov’s hattrick was the “perfect way to end a great season” according to Hendricks.
Luke Hendricks:
“What more could we have asked for, a double is a magnificent success for this team and we are delighted with it. The domestic double is something that hasn’t been done since 2013 when we managed it. It was the perfect way to end a great season and as a new manager I couldn’t be happier”
Player Awards
Player of the Season
Between myself Sergei and Maksim we have decided our 2020/21 Player of the season is Ivan Oblyakov. Yes, the same man who won the award last season has won it for the second year in a row.
Ivan is a player that many don’t notice or appreciate the work he does. With a ridiculous tally of sixteen assists in all competitions, with fifteen of those coming in the league, he also pops up with some incredibly vital goals.
His strike from thirty yards out against Inter Milan will go down as one of the greatest goals in the club's history and it allowed us to win that 3rd spot in the group over Inter. His goal against Spartak Moscow also allowed nerves to be settled early on in a game that eventually became a comfortable victory sealing us the title.
Still aged 22, Ivan was finally rewarded with his first Russian international cap this season and his impressive performances at club level are likely to keep him in the country's national team plans for many a season to come.
Oblyakov, who is also reportedly set to win the Rosgosstrakh Chempionat Rossii player of the year, is a “key man” in Luke Hendricks' future plans.
Luke Hendricks:
“Ivan is a brilliant young man. A player who has pretty much everything you look for. He can pass, he can shoot and he is one of the hardest workers going. He is still very young and has over ten years left at the top, he is a key man for any future plans we have here and I can’t wait to see him develop into an even better talent.”
Young Player of the Season
As full clarity on our rules for young player of the season, the player had to have been under the age of 20 when the season began.
Therefore our young player of the season for 2020/21 is Matko Miljevic. Matko joined the side in a tough position, needing to replace Nikola Vlasic. In his sixteen games Matko managed four goals and showed incredible promise throughout his time. As he continues to adapt and learn the language, he will only continue to improve.
Matko’s stats also show how talented a player he is, completing 90% of his passes, making twelve key passes in his eleven league games. He also averages 1.35 shots on target a game, completing 3.19 dribbles. He is a player we are very excited about at CSKA Armiya and we look forward to seeing him next season.
Fans Player of the Season
The final award goes to Magomed-Shapi Suleimanov, who wins the Fans Player of the Season award with 40.1% of the votes on the poll we put on twitter.
Magomed-Shapi Suleimanov joined the club at the start of the season and despite featuring mainly as a substitute in the first part of the season, Shapi forced his way into the squad following the winter break. In seventeen starts, Shapi scored eight goals in the league and had two assists on top of that.
The 21 year old is another sign of the abundance of talent we have at the club at the moment, with his development seemingly being helped by a former winger in manager Luke Hendricks. Hendricks commented on the winger saying how impressed he has been with the players “commitment to improving” since the return to action.
Luke Hendricks :
“We knew the talent Magomed had, it was clear to us all and that’s why we signed him at the start of the season. He would admit it took him some time to adapt to the club but that can be expected at that age. Since the return after the winter break I have been beyond impressed with his commitment to improving and as such he forced his way into the starting eleven.”
A look ahead
As this season comes to an end, the new one will be just around the corner. Some important dates for you to all look forward to are listed below:
May
18th - Champions Parade
June
7th - Return to Pre-Season Training
11th - Transfer Window Opens
20th - 2021/22 Season Fixtures Announced
July
1st - Felix Passalack officially joins
3rd - Superkubok Rossii
9th-11th Opening Weekend
With some exciting dates ahead, we for now say goodbye after a season of excellence. We look forward to seeing you all soon.
Replies
Justice:It certainly has to be the aim. A dominant domestic campaign and now we need to make that a consistent thing whilst turning our attention to progress in Europe. In terms of Luke, I guess we will have to wait and see what his personal life brings.
Scott:Nobody better to eat his words than Boyra. A great one for sure!
GriffoI know, I know. Must do better!
Eoin:How many Russia puns can you make? More importantly when will they run out
James:Wouldn't put it past Boyra with his track record...
Wolf:Nothing like a bit of vodka to keep you warm in the Russian cold!
lol. In all seriousness, this chairman sounds like a sociopath, his hatred of Luke is something else. Intrigued to see what Sergei will do, now that he knows who the voice belongs to.
Sergei certainly has a dilemma on what he does next!
