Finally, the VTB United League draw is reaching the finish line, the playoff stage is about to start. CSKA is traditionally considered the main favorite of the competition. The team was not stable during the regular season, but at the end it gained momentum and finished it in the first position in the standings. The Moscow "soldiers" will try to get into the next stage of the tournament without any special problems.

CSKA vs Nizhny Novgorod
Nizhny Novgorod misfires under the curtain of the regular season greatly complicate their position. Now you have to fight with the strongest opponent from the very start of the playoffs, which will be a great test of strength and stamina. On April 22, the rivals will clash with each other on the floor of the Megasport Arena in Moscow.
Magnitogorsk "Arena Metallurg" April 20 will be the venue for the second match of the final series of the Gagarin Cup between the local Metallurg and the capital's CSKA. At the moment, the score in the series is 1-0 in favor of CSKA.

Metallurg vs CSKA
In the main event of UFC on ESPN on April 16, UFC fans will get to know potential contender Kamaru Usman. Vicente Luque and Belal Muhammad will face each other to determine who deserves to compete in the race for the title and who should forget about the belt. Belal will look to avenge a long-standing defeat at the hands of the Brazilian, while for Luque, defeating Muhammad will bring him closer to a fight with Usman. We have prepared a forecast for you and have identified a favorite.

Vicente Luque vs Belal Muhammad
The regular draw of the VTB United League is almost over, but some teams remain tournament motivated. Lokomotiv-Kuban gained momentum only towards the end of this stage of the competition, failing its start. But the turning point with the mass departure of legionnaires only had a positive effect on him. The team began to win as stably and confidently as possible, competently spent a long calendar period.

Lokomotiv-Kuban vs Nizhny Novgorod
Nizhny Novgorod is trying to get to the playoffs in the best mood and condition. He won two matches in a row and is not going to stop there. The team will definitely try to take the chance to extend the successful streak. On April 12, the rivals will clash with each other in a face-to-face match.
The fourth meeting of the army confrontation at the semifinal stage of the Gagarin Cup will again be held in Moscow. Hockey players of CSKA and SKA will take to the ice of the capital's CSKA Arena on Friday, April 8. At the moment, the score in the series is 2-1 in favor of CSKA.

CSKA vs SKA
In the 31st round of the Premier League, Tottenham will host Newcastle. The meeting will take place on April 3 at the Tottenham Hotspur stadium in London. Fans are expecting a high end and a large number of goals. The parties are pursuing serious tasks, so they will have to work out to the fullest.

Tottenham vs Newcastle
The next game week in the KHL starts with a match in Balashikha, where Avangard Omsk and Metallurg Magnitogorsk will play their sixth match of the Gagarin Cup quarterfinal series. At the moment, the score in the series is 3-2 in favor of Metallurg.

Avangard vs Metallurg
In March last year, one of the most promising UFC bantamweights from the United States, Aljamain Sterling, was brought into the octagon with the first Russian champion of this category, Petr Yan. The Funk Mastera fight was supposed to be the perfect weapon against the universal from Yekaterinburg, but that fight turned out to be one-sided, and the challenger had no choice but to accept a bitter defeat.

Aljamain Sterling vs Petr Yan
Only now, a mistake on the part of Jan set off such a wave of events that their non-competitive confrontation grew into the most anticipated revenge of 2022. At UFC 273, as the co-main event of the evening, the two will finally decide the fate of the title, which, due to an illegal knee strike, accidentally ended up with an unworthy candidate. Who will lead the division up to 61 kg on April 10? A detailed analysis and clear analytics will help us understand this issue, so let's get started.
The VTB United League has become the main outlet for fans of Russian basketball. After being suspended from the Euroleague, the teams rushed to solve their problems in this tournament. Especially trying CSKA, caught in difficult circumstances. The team was indeed expelled from the main club tournament of the Old World, which was a serious blow to morale. In addition, the legionnaires, who brought great benefits by their actions, left the squad en masse.

CSKA vs Nizhny Novgorod
Nizhny Novgorod fell down, which every day hits the team more and more tangibly. She has lost five matches in a row and is in a terrible emotional state. Basketball players literally stopped believing in their own strength. On March 28, the rivals will meet each other on the floor of the Krylatskoye stadium in Moscow.
As the VTB United League approaches the playoffs, teams are pushing their limits as they battle to make it to the next round of the competition. Not the best state of affairs in Astana, which takes only ninth place in the standings. Therefore, she can quickly go on early leave if she does not correct the situation at the finish line of the regular championship. One gets the feeling that the team is fully focused on the championship of Kazakhstan.

Astana vs Zenit
Zenit is fighting for the title, trying to climb higher. He is well aware that in the playoffs, the advantage of the home court can play a decisive role. Therefore, the team will enter the floor at the limit of motivation, will not play with an opponent in a giveaway. On March 27, the teams will meet each other on the floor of the Saryarka Velodrome arena in Nur-Sultan.
The VTB United League continues to throw up fiery confrontations, although the playoff stage has not yet started. Lokomotiv-Kuban is not spending the season in the best way, stumbles too often. But lately he has become very active and won two matches in a row. The club expects to be able to knock out the advantage of the home court at least in the starting round of the playoffs.

Lokomotiv Kuban vs UNICS
But UNICS for a long time went without defeat, but still made an unfortunate misfire. And it can be fatal, because the team missed the first line in the standings. Now he has ceased to depend only on himself, he is forced to hope for a misfire from CSKA. On March 27, the rivals will clash with each other on the floor of the Basket Hall in Krasnodar.
Last September, UFC Featherweight Champion Alex Volkanovski demonstrated that none of the current contenders could compete with him in a fight. That is why, they again decided to bring him together with Max Holloway, who can be called the only equivalent top for the Australian. Only now the circumstances have developed in such a way that a completely different athlete will fight for the title - Chen Sung Jong, who is everyone's favorite, thanks to his crazy fighting style.

Alex Volkanovski vs Chen Sung Jong
Featherweights will headline UFC 273 in Jacksonville, and over the course of five rounds they will determine the strongest representative of their weight class. It is not at all surprising that Volkanovski was singled out as a serious favorite, but a meeting with such an opponent will in any case be a big challenge for him. And whether the champion will justify the hopes placed on him, or will be left with nothing - we will figure it out in our detailed forecast.
After defeating Mirko Filipovic in 2013, Alexey Oleinik received an offer from the UFC and still fights there, averaging 2-3 fights a year. Many have repeatedly written him off, but Uncle Lyosha goes against the opinions of others, and at UFC on ESPN 33, he will reappear in the octagon. There he will fight with Ilir Latifi - a light heavyweight in the past, who decided not to waste his strength on a meaningless weight race.

Alexey Oleinik vs Ilir Latifi
Ilir has also managed to be forgotten, and his faded performances in recent years do not particularly attract an audience spoiled by the spectacle. That is why, to match his aging colleague, this athlete may soon find himself outside the promotion. On March 27, these two will decide their fate in the sports field and, taking into account Oleinik's words about the "extinguished fire", we should expect that this will be his farewell performance.
In 2019, a titled freestyle wrestler from Russia named Askar Askarov was signed to the UFC, almost immediately thrown under the elite of the flyweight division. However, this did not bother him at all, and in just a few performances he was able to break through to the very top of the rating table, forcing all the current stars of this category to retreat. And now, as part of the main card of UFC on ESPN 33, he will have to share the place of the main contender with Kai Cara-France.

Askar Askarov vs Kai Kara-France
The New Zealander is famous for his cannon right, and his track record also consists of significant names, although he was still inferior to some of them. In any case, these guys will be a serious test for each other, and on March 27, the next in line for a fight with Deiveson Figueredo or Brandon Moreno will be determined, depending on which of them will hold the title at that time.
There have been quite a few fighters in the UFC who have been at arm's length several times before the title fight, but each time they stumbled before the very finish line. So Curtis Blaydes, given the situation in his career, can be safely attributed to the same “lucky ones”. However, Razor still occupies a high position, so he has a future in heavyweight.

Curtis Blaydes vs Chris Daukas
At UFC on ESPN 33, he was honored to take on Philadelphia prospect Chris Daukas in the main event of the evening, for whom this is his second chance in a row to make it to the top five. The matchmakers, as often happens, decided to bring the striker to the wrestler, so the fight promises to be intriguing. And who is more likely to come out of it as a winner - let's look at our prediction.
The quarter-final series between Salavat Yulaev and Tractor moves to Ufa. It is there, on the ice of the local Ufa Arena, that the third match of the series between these teams will take place on March 21. The score in the series is 1-1.

Salavat Yulaev vs Tractor
Leipzig will host Eintracht at home on March 20 as part of the 27th round of the Bundesliga. A fundamentally important meeting for both opponents. The hosts continue to fight for participation in the most prestigious European tournament, and the guests are trying to stabilize the game.

RB Leipzig vs Eintracht
The start of the semi-final confrontation of the Eastern Conference between Metallurg and Avangard is scheduled for March 18. The first game of the series will take place in Magnitogorsk, on the ice of the Metallurg Arena.

Metallurg vs Avangard


March 16, within the framework of the first round of the playoffs of the Champions League, at the Allianz Arena (Turin), the teams of Juventus and Villarreal will measure their strength. The result of the first match is 1:1.

Juventus vs Villarreal
Confrontations between Russian fighters on American soil became commonplace when Russian athletes began to be massively signed up for Western promotions. And at UFC Fight Night 204, a pair of heavyweights, Shamil Abdurahimov and Sergey Pavlovich, will split the octagon to challenge the 10th position in the ratings, which, despite recent misses, is still held by a native of Dagestan.

Shamil Abdurahimov vs Sergey Pavlovich
For Pavlovich, this is a real opportunity to become the top, having passed an age-old opponent, but this fight will not be easy for him. Despite its age, the Abrek still has enough gunpowder to compete at a fairly high level. Therefore, we will conduct a detailed analysis before determining a potential winner in this fight.
The regular draw of the VTB United League is reaching the finish line, the participants are starting to distribute places before the start of the playoffs. Nizhny Novgorod lost in six of the last eight matches, and ended up in a protracted gaming crisis. He has already fallen to the seventh position in the standings of the competition, but he is well aware that he will definitely be in the next stage. The main problem of the team was the weak attacking line, which scored only 872 points in 11 meetings.

Nizhny Novgorod vs UNICS
UNICS continues to churn out victories and dominate, looking almost flawless. In addition, representatives of the club reported that the key foreign players are not going to leave Kazan. The team has a great opportunity not only to finish the preliminary stage in the first position, but also to compete for the coveted title. On March 14, the rivals will clash with each other at the site of the Nagorny stadium in Nizhny Novgorod.


On March 12, Manchester United will host Tottenham Hotspur in the 29th round of the English Premier League. The meeting will take place at the Old Trafford stadium in Manchester. Confrontation of principal rivals who are fighting for qualification to the Champions League following the results of the current draw. Fans are waiting for the battle.

Manchester United vs Tottenham
Ukrainian light heavyweight, Nikita Krylov, has experienced many ups and downs in his long professional career. He returned to the UFC twice, proving his competitiveness over and over again. Once again entrenched in the TOP-10, he will have a very difficult fight with an uncomfortable opponent, the Scot Paul Craig.

Nikita Krylov vs Paul Craig
Craig is distinguished by his hot temper - he never ended the fights with refereeing decisions, even in case of defeats, and his skills on the ground caused problems for many guys from the division up to 93 kg. The classic confrontation between a grappler and a karateka is sure to give the audience a fascinating spectacle, and we, in turn, will single out in this pair the one who is most likely to emerge victorious at UFC Fight Night 204.
Ufa Arena on March 10 will be the venue for the fifth game of the first round of the Gagarin Cup between local Salavat Yulaev and Novosibirsk Siberia. The score in the series is 3-1 in favor of Salavat Yulaev.

Salavat Yulaev vs Siberia
Russian clubs were banned from participating in the Euroleague, so they turned their attention to the VTB United League. Avtodor continues to make noise there, which is deservedly considered one of the main discoveries of the current competition draw. The team managed to present several high-profile sensations, looks great and constantly adds. She expects to first break into the playoffs from a high place, and then compete for the main prize of the competition.

Avtodor vs CSKA
CSKA is in a very difficult situation, forced to constantly think about how to fix the current situation. Firstly, the team can frankly crumble after being removed from the Euroleague. Secondly, many legionnaires have already expressed their desire to leave the team. On March 7, the rivals will meet each other on the floor of the Kristall Arena in Saratov.

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