May 3, 2021
The 2021 season in Kazakhstan has reached Round 9, with the season starting on March 13th, and scheduled to finish on October 30th. There are 14 sides in the Kazakhstan Premier League who play each other twice for a 26 game season. The Champions will qualify for the First Qualifying round of the UEFA Champions League, with the runners-up, third place side and the Cup Winners entering the Europa Conference League. The bottom two sides will be relegated to the First League.
Sides in the Premier League are permitted to sign 8 foreign players, but only 5 can be on the field at any time. For sponsorship reasons the league is officially called the Olimpbet Championship of Kazakhstan,
Matches are streamed live on Bet365.com, and also via the Kazakhstan Premier League website ( www.pflk.kz ). Highlights are available on the QAZSPORT TV YouTube channel in addition to the Kazakh Premier League website.
The Kazakhstan Premier League has been contested 30 times since its creation following the break-up of the Soviet Union. Astana have won the most titles, winning in 6 consecutive years between 2014 and 2019, although their run was ended after a third place finish in 2020. The Champions in 2020 were Kairat Almaty, who have won three titles, but they were the only Kazakh side to compete in the Soviet Top League, featuring in 24 seasons. They also won the Soviet First League in 1976 and 1983. As a result they have often been viewed as the side representing the Kazakh nation, and have support from all over the country.
Irtysh Pavlovar have won 5 titles but they withdrew from the league in 2020 due to financial reasons and now play in the Kazakh First League. FC Aktobe have also won 5 titles and returned to the Premier League for 2021 after one season at the second level.
The Kazakhstan Premier League was ranked 24th in Europe for the 2020/21 season although performances from their sides this season have seen a fall to 27th for next year. Champions Astana were eliminated from the Champions League are a 2-6 hammering at Dinamo Brest, a match previously previewed in these diaries. After dropping down to the Europa League Astana were surprisingly eliminated after a 0-1 home defeat to Montenegrin side Buducnost Podgorica.
Kazakhstan’s direct representatives into the Europa League First Qualifying round saw Ordabasy lose 1-2 at home to Romanian side FC Botosani but Kairat triumphed 4-1 over Armenian side Noah. However, in the Second qualifying Round Kairat lost 1-2 in Israel to Maccabi Haifa, whilst Cup Winners Kaisar Kyzylorda were eliminated by APOEL Nicosia after a 1-4 home loss.
Going into today’s matches, Astana have made a strong start to regain their title, leading the table with 7 wins and 2 draws after 9 matches, 5 points clear of Tobol Kostanay and 6 points ahead of FC Taraz. Kairat have made a disappointing start to the defence of title, sitting 8 points behind in 4th place but having played a game less. Qyzyljar, their opponents today, lay in 5th place 2 points behind Kairat.
Kairat play in Almaty, the largest city in Kazakhstan with a population of approximately 2 million people. It was the capital of Kazakhstan until 1988, when this was moved to Astana, which has since been renamed Nur-Sultan. Their home ground is the Central Stadium, which has a capacity of just under 24,000 and their traditional colours are yellow and black stripes, with black shorts. The name Kairat apparently translates as power !
Going into today’s match Kairat had played three away matches, winning 1-0 at Kaisar Kyzylorda, drawing 1-1 with Kaspyi Aktau and surprisingly going down 0-1 to Aytrau. Three members of their squad were in the most recent Kazakhstan national squad, keeper Pokatilov ( 22 caps ), centre back Alip ( 8 caps ) and midfielder Abiken ( 12 caps ).
Their foreign contingent includes flamboyant 36 year old Brazilian International striker Vagner Love, who had a long career successfully representing CSKA Moscow in the Champions League, Ukrainian striker Aderinsola Habib Eserola, Croatian right-back Dino Mikanovic, Montenegrin midfielder Nemanja Kosovic ( 26 caps ) and ex Malaga and Legia Warsaw Guinean striker Jose Kante ( 13 caps ), who is their leading goal scorer with 5 goals so far. Armenian midfielder Kamo Hovhannisyan has won 55 caps for his country, and has previously played for Torpedo Zhodino in Belarus, and midfielder Gulzhigit Alykulov has 6 caps for Kyrgyztan.
Qyzyljar play in Petropavlovsk a city in the north of Kazakhstan with a population of just over 200,000 and is located on the Trans-Siberian railway. They have twice been runners-up in the Kazakh league, although the last time was in 2000, and last season they finished 9th.
Their form in 2021 has been much better, with a 4-1-2 record, with wins over Shakhtar Karagandy ( H 2-0 ), Akzhayik ( A 1-0 ), Zhetzyu Kaldykorgan ( H 3-0 ) and Kaisar Kyzylorda ( A 2-1 ). They achieved a respectable 0-0 draw at Taraz on the opening day of the season, but went down to Aktobe ( H 1-2 ) and Astana ( A 1-3 ).
Qyzyljar play at the 11,000 capacity Karasai Stadium, with their colours being red and black stripes, with red shorts. There are no current Kazakh internationals in their squad, but Ukrainian midfielder Yuri Bushman will be familiar to readers of these diaries having played for Kauno Zalgiris in Lithuania last season. Russian ex Rotor Volvograd keeper Miroslav Lobantsev currently leads the Kazakh clean sheets chart, veteran Belarus centre-back Valeriy Karshakevich has played for Torpedo Zhodino, Dinamo Brest, Slutsk and Gomel amongst others, Argentine midfielder Pablo Podio had a spell in the Czech Republic with Zlin, and Russian defensive midfielder Oleg Murachev was once on the books of Lokomotiv and Torpedo Moscow.
Montengrin attacking midfielder Darko Zoric ( 4 caps ) had a spell with AEK Athens and veteran Brazilian forward Danilo Alves has just joined from South Korean side Suwon.
The journey from Almaty to Petropavlosk is over 1,700 km, or 27 hours by road, or just under 2 hours by air. Kick-off was 16.00 local time ( 11.00 UK ) with temperatures of 10 degrees with the threat of heavy rain forecast.
Qyzyljar made two changes from the side that won as Kaisar Kyzylorda with Dairov replacing Esimov at right back and Muldinov replacing Zoric in midfield. Kairat made one change from their last match, a 3-0 win at home to Ordabasy, with Kante replacing Vagner Love, who wasn’t even in the match-day squad. Although matches at Turan and Taraz have recently been played in front of spectators, today’s match was announced on the Kazakhstan Premier League website as being behind closed doors. However, as the players came on to the pitch a fair number of spectators were visible braving the rain in the uncovered stand opposite the main camera !
The players names on the back of their shirts appeared in roman script for both sides, although the perimeter advertising hoardings were written in a mix of cyrillic and roman letters. The groundsmen deserved a special mention, having prepared very broad light and dark green cut grass strips across the pitch.
Qyzyljar started the match as 6/1 outsiders with Bet365, with Kairat 2/5 favourites. The draw was offered at 11/4.
Qyzyljar got off to a fast start, Alves’ flicked on header gave Muldinov a possible sight on goal in the first minute, but the ball was cleared for a corner before he could react. The opening minutes were frantic, with the ball moving from end to end, but gradually Kairat took command of the game. Alykulov had a shot deflected over the bar, and home keeper Lobantsev did well to push away a long range skidding shot.
Qyzyljar had to make an early substitution, with Bushman having to go off with what appeared to be a hamstring injury, and being replaced by the portly Drachenko, formerly of Shakter and Olimpik Donetsk.
Kairat took the lead in the 27th minutes after what was probably a well worked corner routine. Keiler’s left-footed corner was flicked on by Kante at the near post for Polyakov to arrive at the far post to head home.
The home side offered little in response, and Kairat went into the break deservedly leading 1-0. They had nearly added a second but Abikan’s shot clipped the top of the crossbar.
Kairat dominated the second half but failed to increase their lead. Murachev’s sliding block thwarted Kante and Lobantsev did well to parry Keiler;s swerving effort and gather the rebound after it hit Karshakevich. Alykulov shot into the side netting, and Karshakevich was forced to pull down Kante just outside the area after the Guinean had surged from the halfway line. Kosovic wasted the free-kick though. Kante sent another shot just over the bar, and Lobantsev made another fine save, spreading himself to block Hovhannisyan’s effort after he had run from the half-way line.
Out of the blue, Kairat were made to regret all these missed chances as Qyzyljar equalised with 13 minutes left to play. An in-swinging corner was only partially cleared, abd Kassym swept the ball home through a crowd of players.
Both sides pressed for a winner, but neither were able to fashion any clear-cut chances, the closest being Alip’s dangerous cross in added on time, but the a home defender hooked it away to safety before any Kairat attacker could get to it.
Kairat will see this as more points dropped as they lost more ground to Astana in the title race. Qyzylijar looked very happy with their point.
Qyzyljar Petropavlovsk : Lobantsev- Dairov, Karshakevich, Kassym, Schmidt ( Esimov ) – Saparov ( Kone ), Bushman ( Drachenko ), Podio, Murachev, Muldenov ( Batyrkanov ) - Alves
Kairat Almaty – Pokatilov – Mikanovic, Alip, Polyakov, Keiler –Hovhannisyan, Kosovic, Eserola ( Shushenachev ), Abiken, Alykulov ( Usenov ) – Kante
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