Rubin Kazan Hosts Akhmat Grozny In Monday Russian Premier League Soccer

While the soccer world is waiting for the big European Leagues like the German Bundesliga and English Premier League to get underway there’s a few national circuits that have already started their season. One is the Russian Premier League which is concluding it’s third week of regular season fixtures with a Monday highlight game that has Akhmat Grozny traveling to Kazan to take on Rubin Kazan at the Kazan Arena.

Not surprisingly, the league table is tightly bunched at this early juncture of the season. Rubin Kazan played their first two games on the road earning a 1-0 win at Dinamo Moskva and a 1-1 draw at Lokomotiv Moskva. Dinamo Moskva finished in the lower half of the table last season just avoiding a relegation playoff but the draw at Lokomotiv Moskva is significantly more impressive. Lokomotiv finished in second place last season so taking a point in a tough early season road fixture is a strong result for Rubin Kazan. They only finished 3 points ahead of Dinamo Moskva last season so their strong start to the campaign is something of a surprise but they’ve got a great chance to maintain their momentum in this home contest.

Akhmat Grozny was a middle of the pack team last season finishing 8th out of 16 teams going 11-9-10. They opened this year with a 1-0 home win over Krasnodar but followed that up with a 3-0 loss to Ural at the Ekaterinburg Arena. Krasnodar was the #3 team in the Russian Premiership last season so that home win was solid but losing to the #10 ranked Ural has to be seen as a disappointing result. Grozny was a fairly capable road team a year ago taking points in 8 of 15 road fixtures going 6-2-7. They’ve got a few injuries to deal with entering this game and defender Wilker Angel along with midfielders Ravanelli and Denis Glushakov will all miss this matchup. Kazan is fairly healthy but will be without the services of midfielder Evgeni Bashkirov who is serving a suspension for a red card booking.

Khazan beat Akhmat by a 1-0 score at this venue a year ago and fought to a 1-1 draw at the Akhmat Arena. One only need look at the Russian soccer odds to see that the expectation is for a tight, low scoring game at this juncture of the season but we like the healthier home side to keep their undefeated streak to start the season intact.

BET RUBIN KAZAN PK, -1/2 +112 OVER AKHMAT GROZNY

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