Krasnodar lost to Rubin, Spertsyan played the full match

Following Zenit, Krasnodar also dropped points in the 20th round of the Russian Premier League (MIR RPL). The league leaders lost away to Kazan’s Rubin with a score of 1–2.

Armenia national team midfielder Ugochukwu Iwu missed the match for Rubin due to injury. Armenia national team captain Eduard Spertsyan started for Krasnodar and played the entire match. According to SofaScore, his performance was rated 6.7.

The Bulls had serious problems in attack and created very few dangerous chances. The visitors managed to score their only goal only in stoppage time — John Córdoba scored in the 93rd minute.

Rubin opened the scoring in the 24th minute, when Nazmi Gripshi scored his debut goal in the Russian Premier League. After the break, the hosts doubled their advantage — Konstantin Nizhegorodov scored in the 74th minute, also netting his first goal in the league. Gripshi was named the man of the match according to a Match Premier expert.

This victory became Rubin’s first under head coach Frank Artiga. The Kazan club collected 26 points and moved up to 7th place in the standings.

Despite the defeat — their first in 11 matches — Krasnodar remains at the top of the table with 43 points.

In the 21st round of the MIR RPL, Krasnodar will play away against Sochi on March 14, while Rubin will host Lokomotiv on March 15.