SKA is the best team in the KHL with one defeat this season. How Rothenberg-coach achieved such cool results

Daria TuboltsevaA cool coaching staff, a balanced line-up and a system is the secret of the army team’s success. The most powerful team in the first month and a half of the KHL regular season is SKA. With a decent margin of seven points, St. Petersburg are leading the standings. The Army Men have won 16 out of 17 matches this season and are now on a seven-game winning streak. Before the start, many experts assumed that Roman Rotenberg’s team would be in the lead and could well win the regular season. One quarter of the smooth championship has already passed and we can say that SKA has even surpassed all expectations. Perhaps this is the only club in the league that will not experience serious problems, or rather there are problems, but they do not affect the result. For more than a month, the St. Petersburg team played without the main goalkeeper. Alexander Samonov was injured on September 9 and returned to the squad only on October 11. True, it should be noted that in the preseason, the 27-year-old goalkeeper did not give the impression of a reliable first number. In his absence, 22-year-old Dmitry Nikolaev played, who had only 5 games in the KHL before this season. The goalkeeper, who was never seen as talented as, for example, in Askarov, did an excellent job – he has 94.8% of shots saved. Such statistics happened and largely due to the well-coordinated work of the team in defense – the army team conceded the least (26 goals in 17 matches). And it’s not to say that Rotenberg has no losses. Defender Pashnin has not played since mid-September due to an injury, but even without him, the defense copes with a bang. SKA has the second minority in the league – 90.5% (only CSKA is better). Most are slightly worse – 18.8%, but these numbers cannot be called bad either. The main strength of today’s army is their reliable and well-coordinated system. And here it is necessary to note the coaching staff: Rotenberg, acting in it as a manager, ideological inspirer, motivator, leader, lured Evgeny Koreshkov from CSKA in the offseason, invited Sergey Zubov, who had already worked as the head for many years, a year earlier Konstantin Shafranov moved to the Northern capital – one of the best coaches by most in the KHL. And here it is important that none of the specialists pull the blanket over themselves, each performs certain functions, and does it well. For the same Alexei Kudashov and Anvar Gatiyatulin, it was hard to work under the leadership of Ilya Vorobyov at one time. Vladimir Bezzubov, photo.khl.ruYes, and the selection of players allows the modern SKA to be a system machine. Firstly, he is simply strong and diverse for today’s KHL (do not compare with the times of Datsyuk and Kovalchuk, the level of the league has fallen during this time). There are attacking defenders (Nikishin, Ozhiganov) and defensive players (Pedan, Falkovsky). A wide choice in attack: from such recognized stars as Yashkin and Zhafyarov, to young and rising talents like Khusnutdinov, Khairullin (not so young anymore, but only becoming a bright player). It is important that this season revealed those whose prospects were in great doubt. We are talking about Valentin Zykov (15 points in 17 games) and Alexander Volkov (13 points in 17 games). The latter, of course, the owner of the Stanley Cup and played in the NHL, but last year showed nothing at all. Mikhail Vorobyov is adding, and this despite the trial, which has only recently ended. And this is Nikolai Prokhorkin (potentially the first center) does not have a single match in the season. Forward, apparently, continues to recover from an injury received in the summer. What will happen when he appears in the squad? You can’t call SKA’s game bright, they don’t weave lace in St. Petersburg, but they show fast hockey (fast players were selected for this style). Roman Rotenberg at press conferences often likes to speak in clichés about “powerful attack and reinforced concrete defense”, “play according to one system”, “play from a position of strength”. And no matter how trite it may sound, all this is now being implemented. However, the most important thing is not even that, but the fact that the team has character. The army team knows how to bounce back (five strong-willed wins, four wins outside of regular time in the season) and are able to add great after an unsuccessful first / second period. They know how to endure, as was the case in the recent match with Spartak (5:1), when the score was opened only at the end of the second period. Right now, SKA has no weaknesses in sight. It is unlikely that the team will be able to maintain such a level throughout the season. Recessions are sure to follow, without them it is simply impossible, even with such a long bench as the army team. And it will be extremely interesting to see how St. Petersburg will overcome a difficult period. Winning streaks in the fall are great. But everyone is well aware that in the spring in the KHL hockey will be different and something more will need to be shown. Subscribe to the telegram channel of Daria Tuboltseva