Ak Bars vs SKA. Who will win the central fight of the day?
Kazan Ak Bars, which is in crisis, will play with St. Petersburg SKA on Tuesday, October 14. The main match of the game day in the KHL will take place on the ice of the Kazan Tatneft Aren.
The Kazan club fell into a functional hole, which, in principle, was expected. Ak Bars is one of the oldest clubs in the KHL and it is naive to expect that the team will go the long distance of the regular season without declines. Injuries to Ak Bars leaders also had an impact; Radulov and Shipachev were forced to miss several matches, which seriously affected the attacking potential of the Kazan team. Bars still have injuries, but young forwards Maxim Bykov and Semyon Terekhov, as well as goalkeeper Amir Miftakhov, are rather rotation players and their absence is not so critical.
Ak Bars did not have the best last away series, winning only one victory in three matches. The match against Barys turned out to be victorious, the score of the game in Kazakhstan was 3-0. Then Barsy lost 2-3 in Tolyatti Lada and had an absolutely faceless game in Magnitogorsk. In the game against the local Metallurg, Bars lost almost twice as many shots on target - 47 to 24, which led to a logical defeat of 0-3. Despite the current chain of failures, Ak Bars continues to remain among the leaders of the Eastern Conference, occupying third place with 38 points.
SKA
The St. Petersburg club also had its own gaming crisis. The army team did not shine at the start of the season anyway, but at the turn of October-November they managed to lose four times in five matches, at some point even finding themselves outside the top eight of the Western Conference. The vaunted St. Petersburg defense did not work at all in these matches; 18 goals conceded in 5 matches is an eloquent indicator of a problematic position.
The championship calendar played into the hands of SKA hockey players, sending the army team home to St. Petersburg for two matches. Although not without problems, Roman Rotenberg’s team managed to take four points out of four possible, first defeating Traktor 4-3 in overtime, and then beating Neftekhimik 4-2 in regulation time. Two victories in a row allowed the St. Petersburg team to return to the top eight in the West; SKA now has 30 points and is currently in 6th place.
Our Expert Predictions & Analysis on Ak Bars vs SKA
Ak BarsThe Kazan club fell into a functional hole, which, in principle, was expected. Ak Bars is one of the oldest clubs in the KHL and it is naive to expect that the team will go the long distance of the regular season without declines. Injuries to Ak Bars leaders also had an impact; Radulov and Shipachev were forced to miss several matches, which seriously affected the attacking potential of the Kazan team. Bars still have injuries, but young forwards Maxim Bykov and Semyon Terekhov, as well as goalkeeper Amir Miftakhov, are rather rotation players and their absence is not so critical.
Ak Bars did not have the best last away series, winning only one victory in three matches. The match against Barys turned out to be victorious, the score of the game in Kazakhstan was 3-0. Then Barsy lost 2-3 in Tolyatti Lada and had an absolutely faceless game in Magnitogorsk. In the game against the local Metallurg, Bars lost almost twice as many shots on target - 47 to 24, which led to a logical defeat of 0-3. Despite the current chain of failures, Ak Bars continues to remain among the leaders of the Eastern Conference, occupying third place with 38 points.
SKA
The St. Petersburg club also had its own gaming crisis. The army team did not shine at the start of the season anyway, but at the turn of October-November they managed to lose four times in five matches, at some point even finding themselves outside the top eight of the Western Conference. The vaunted St. Petersburg defense did not work at all in these matches; 18 goals conceded in 5 matches is an eloquent indicator of a problematic position.
The championship calendar played into the hands of SKA hockey players, sending the army team home to St. Petersburg for two matches. Although not without problems, Roman Rotenberg’s team managed to take four points out of four possible, first defeating Traktor 4-3 in overtime, and then beating Neftekhimik 4-2 in regulation time. Two victories in a row allowed the St. Petersburg team to return to the top eight in the West; SKA now has 30 points and is currently in 6th place.
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