Nuraly Alip played two official matches for Zenit in the Russian Cup and Championship. The bbabo.net correspondent tells how the debut of the defender of the Kazakhstan national team in the Russian club turned out and what awaits him next.
Lightweight check
Alip played his first match in Russia against the Kamaz FNL team. Sergey Semak significantly rotated the squad and gave a chance to newcomers, as well as Russians who are not base players. Alip went to the base, spent 90 minutes, "Zenith" did not concede and scored six goals. In general, in terms of work in defense, it was a fairly easy match for Nuraly. There was not much pressure from the opponent, as a result, the Kazakhstani won 69 percent of martial arts, made nine interceptions, fouled twice and gave 89 assists. In terms of attack, Nuraly did not take risks, there were practically no medium and long passes from him, there were no opportunities to break through on goal on his own.
In the RPL, Alip played against Ufa and this time he came out only as a substitute, with a comfortable score. In the 78th minute, the defender replaced the Brazilian midfielder Wendel, but the Kazakhstani himself went to the usual position of the left central defender. In the allotted 15 minutes, Alip managed to shoot once on goal, made three accurate passes and was successful twice in martial arts.
Attack Connections
In the match with "Ufa" Alip managed to take part in a rather dangerous attack and could well have scored. After the selection in the center of the field, the Kazakhstani ran into a counterattack and shot at the goal from the left half-flank, the goalkeeper parried the blow, Claudinho arrived in time for finishing, but the ball never crossed the line.
Probably, the coaching staff of Zenit does not prohibit Alip from such activity in the attack, because we remember his goal scored in a friendly match with Brondby, where he also situationally went ahead and completed the counterattack with a magnificent blow.
Considering that the last matches of “Zenith” plays in three central defenders, connecting to the attack of one of the extreme is not accidental and permissible. Rakitskiy used to do it, now Douglas Santos, so Alip has a chance to realize his attacking potential. It is noteworthy that at the training camp Semak noted the following in Nuraly's game: "We will work on his game in defense, but in attack he is doing well."
Rakytsky's departure has no effect so far
The injury of Dejan Lovren and the departure of Yaroslav Rakitskiy at the moment have not globally affected the status of Alip. He is still perceived as a rotation player. All because Semak has resources in defense, so he pushed the universal Barrios and Douglas Santos into the center of defense. These are players of the highest level, with whom it would be difficult to compete even with the leading defenders of the Russian national team.
If none of the legionnaires leave anymore, then the combination of Barrios - Chistyakov - Douglas Santos will definitely finish this season. Moreover, Danil Krugovoi played excellently as a left lateral, which means that Santos does not need to return to this position.
In this regard, Alip can count on playing practice only in the matches of the Russian Cup, although this is not a fact, given that there is already a high stage and the qualifications of opponents are improving. However, even occasional substitutions are not bad in a team like Zenit. These three-plus months are more likely for the adaptation of the Kazakhstani in the club and the league. But in the summer a lot can change and then Alip will already be able to fully qualify for the base player in the Semak team.
Leading table "Russian Championship 2021/22"
No. PARTICIPANTS VNPM O 1 Zenit 20 13 5 2 49-22 44 2 Dynamo M 20 12 3 5 36-22 39 3 Sochi 20 12 1 7 33-21 37 4 CSKA M 20 11 3 6 24-16 36 5 Krasnodar 19 9 5 5 31-19 32 6 Lokomotiv M 19 8 7 4 27-21 31 7 Akhmat 20 10 0 10 27-27 30 8 Krylya Sovetov 19 8 4 7 24-20 28 9 Spartak M 20 7 5 8 22-28 26 10 Rubin 20 7 4 9 27-31 25 11 Nizhny Novgorod(II) 20 6 4 10 19-31 22 12 Arsenal T 20 5 5 10 23 -39 20 13 Ural 20 4 7 9 13-21 19 14 Rostov 19 4 6 9 30-36 18 15 Ufa 20 3 7 10 18-30 16 16 Khimki 20 2 8 10 18-37 14 Go to the tournament table page →
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