FIFA World Cup 2018 Report: Russia 3 - 1 Egypt

From Macdara Ferris in the St. Petersburg Stadium

Russia backed up their stunning opening night performance in this World Cup by dismissing Egypt 3-1 in St. Petersburg on Tuesday evening in their second group game. The win came with three second half goals, starting with an own goal and added to by Denis Cheryshev and Artem Dzyuba who both continued their good vein of goalscoring form.

The talk had all been about Mo beforehand. While Mohammed Salah made Hector Cuper’s starting line up, and got on the scoresheet with a second half penalty for the Egyptians, it wasn’t enough to help his team find their first ever win in the World Cup.

Coming into the starting line up was the home favourite Artur Dzyuba. Well known to the Zenit St. Petersburg fans (and familiar with Dundalk supporters from their Europa League encounter), he superbly led the line for the hosts who were seeking six points to almost certainly seal their progression to the next round.

His physical 6 foot 5 prescence certainly caused the Pharoah’s difficulty but it also allowed them to play a high line knowing they had the speed to deal with any balls over the top that Alexander Samedov looked to play in.

They couldn’t get an early goal to settle the nerves like they had against Saudi Arabia but they did come close. Having lost late against Uruguay in their opening game, the Egyptians needed three points to stay in the running and they played with a higher tempo than they had against the South Americans.

Some early set pieces for Russia, with corners sent in by Alexander Samedov saw Sergey Ignashevich go close with a header. Playmaker Aleksandr Golovin couldn’t get a clean connection to his shot inside the opening ten minutes.

The closest they came to an opener was from Denis Cheryshev, the only Russian player who plys his trade outside of the motherland. His right foot effort had Mohamed El Shenawy reaching out with an arm but the ball flew just over it and the crossbar.

It was a cacophony of ‘Russia, Russia’ chants from the local fans at that stage but the visitors soon found their voice. 16 minutes in and the sizeable number of travelling supporters thought they might have taken the lead as Mahmoud Hassan ‘Trezeguet’ shot just by the post.

They were looking to get Salah into the game but the experienced Yury Zhirkov had him reasonably well marshalled. The former Chelsea player let his man go though after a clever dummy by Marwan Mohsan and that allowed Salah a sight of goal with three minutes of the first half remaining but he couldn’t finish.

The fear coming into this World Cup was that Russia were so weak that they could be out of the tournament with less than a week into this festival of football. No such problems for Stanislav Cherchesov’s men though who scored three second half goals to confound the critics having managed to score eight goals in their opening two games.

The priority for Egypt was to deal with Dzyba and in trying to prevent him getting a tap in two minutes into the second half, Ahmed Fathi put the ball in his own net for the opening goal.

Golovin’s cross was punched clear to Roman Zobnin but his return shot was touched home by the Pharaohs captain to give Russia an early second half 1-0 lead

A minute before the hour mark they had their second after sweeping Russian move involving Dzyuba, Samedov and a great run by Mario Fernandes. He turnedTrezeguet in the box and his cut back fell beautifully for Cheryshev to score with his left foot – his third goal in two games.

Three minutes later they had their third with a classic centre forward strike by Dzyuba. He took a long ball from his own half on his chest, took a touch to beat Mario Fernandes and then rifled the ball home.

Trezeguet’s last touch was to send a shot inches wide of the post before Hector Cuper turned to Ramadan Sobhi off the bench. Unsurprisingly though it was Salah who gave the Egyptian’s a lifeline winning a VAR reviewed penalty and tucking it away with a top notch left foot strike from 12 yards.

Roman Zobnin pulled Salah back on the very edge of the box and while it looked like the Paraguayan ref would give only a free kick, the VAR boys back in Moscow confirmed it was a penalty.

The Russian supporters cheered their team home as they saw out the game and their boys head to Samara next to face Uruguay looking like they will become the fifth hosts in the last six World Cups to top their group.

Russia: Igor Akinfeev; Mario Fernandes, Ilya Kutepov, Sergei Ignashevich, Yuri Zhirkov (Fedor Kudryashov 86); Roman Zobnin, Yury Gazinsky; Alexsandr Samedov, Aleksandr Golovin, Denis Cheryshev (Daler Kuziaev 74); Artem Dzyuba (Fedor Smolov 78).

Subs not used:  Vladimir Gabulov, Andrey Lunev, Vladimir Granat, Andrey Semenov, Igor Smolnikov, Daler Kuzyaev, Anton Miranchuk, Aleksey Miranchuk.

Booked: Fedor Smolov (84)

Egypt: Mohammed El Shenawy; Ahmed Fathi, Ali Gabr, Ahmed Hegazy, Mohammed Abdelshafy; Tarek Hamed, Mohammed El Neny (Amr Warda 64); Mohammed Salah, Abdallah Said, Mahmoud Hassan Trezeguet (Ramadan Sobhi 68); Marwan Mohsen (Kahraba).

Subs not used: Essam El Hadary, Sherif Ekramy, Saad Samir, Ayman Ashraf, Mahmoud Hamdy, Ahmed Elmohamady, Omar Gaber, Shikabala, Abdullah Al Said,  Sam Morsy.

Booked: Trezeguet (57).

Referee: Enrique Caceres (Paraguay).

Attendance: 64,468.

Extratime.ie Player of the Match: Artem Dzyuba (Russia)