Five rounds is a sample you should be careful drawing conclusions from. But sometimes the numbers line up so neatly that ignoring them is impossible.
Baltika travels to Khimki sixth in the table, with seven points and a positive expected-goals difference. Rodina awaits in thirteenth, with four points and the worst xG balance in the league: 4.12 created, 11.99 conceded (FotMob).
Two teams that rarely have the ball
Baltika is last in the RPL for possession: 37.2%. And last for accurate passes per match: 183.8 (FotMob). Rodina: 39.0% on average over five rounds and just 71.8% passing accuracy. These aren't coincidences: after round two Juan Díaz said outright that the team needed to adapt to the RPL, and his footballing idea is compactness without the ball and quick attacks after winning it back.
But somebody will have to take the ball. And if it falls to Baltika, it'll have to play a kind of football it rarely plays.
The only match this season in which Talalaev's team had the ball for more than half the time was the home draw with Rubin: 55% possession and 0.18 xG from open play across the whole match (FotMob). And it rescued a point at 90+4 after a cross from Pospelov. Low xG in positional attack here isn't an illness to be cured but a line of expenditure the team consciously doesn't spend on.
3.73 from set pieces — not poverty, but a choice
Here's the headline number of this piece. Over five rounds Baltika has accumulated 6.50 xG, and you can add it up yourself: 3.73 from set pieces plus 1.99 from open play plus 0.78 from Gil's penalty against Dynamo. FotMob lists penalties as a separate line and they don't count in the 3.73 — otherwise it would inflate exactly the figure this whole text rests on.
From round two onwards Baltika's xG from set pieces has exceeded its xG from open play by a factor of 2 to 5: 0.44 against 0.18 with Dynamo, 0.97 against 0.44 with Krylia, 0.85 against 0.23 with Spartak, 0.87 against 0.18 with Rubin.
And now the surprise: from open play, over the last four rounds, Baltika has accumulated 1.03 xG — exactly as much as Rodina accumulated in a single match in St Petersburg, where it beat Zenit 2:1.
Five of Baltika's seven goals have come from set pieces — and three of them not from corners but from throw-in routines: Offor in the first minute against CSKA, Civic in the third against Krylia, Mendel in the 23rd against Spartak. Baltika hasn't scored a single goal from an open-play cross. For set-piece goals the team is first in the RPL; for set-piece goals conceded it's also first: zero.
The most important thing about this statistic is that set pieces don't fall from the sky. Baltika is 16th in the league for possession but 5th for touches in the opposition box — 127 over five rounds. With such a shortage of the ball, ending up in the opposition box more often than most teams is possible in only one way: by winning it back closer to the opposition goal. First in the RPL for interceptions (13.8 per match), fourth for tackles in the final third (3.4) (FotMob). The three goals from throw-ins come from the same place: the ball gets knocked out of play high up the pitch and under pressure, not in midfield.
So reading the 3.73-to-1.99 gap as poverty is a mistake. The team isn't trying to be something it isn't: it doesn't play through false nines and third-man runs into the box, it perfects what works for it. Zero conceded from set pieces alongside first place for set-piece goals scored isn't an imbalance, it's a specialisation that has been won.
What Rodina can actually do
The RPL debutant concedes 22 shots per match and is kept afloat by Sergei Volkov's 29 saves. But Rodina's eight goals have come almost exclusively in transition: Pozo in the fourth minute against Rostov after Maksimenko's delivery in a quick attack, two goals from Garibyan off the bench away at Zenit, Pozo's goal after Marinkin's turnover in the match with Dynamo.
Set pieces, meanwhile, Rodina seemingly doesn't regard as its tool at all: 3.76 of its 4.12 xG comes from open play and just 0.37 from dead balls over five matches. The same shortage of possession as Baltika, only converted into a different currency — and so far a smaller one.
One more number our coaching staff has certainly looked at: Rodina's xGOT is 5.58 with eight goals scored. Conversion above expectation, and over five matches that isn't skill, it's luck. The trouble is that luck hasn't been told it's due to run out precisely on 30 August.
Where Rodina gets opened up
I went through all 14 goals conceded in the match reports. The list of mechanisms turned out to be suspiciously short:
- six goals from crosses and cut-backs from the flanks (including Križan's own goal after Mironov's cross);
- two from balls in behind the defenders;
- three from combinations and rebounds in the box;
- one each from a mistake playing out of defence, a penalty and a long-range shot.
And here's the detail that turns the list into a plan: four of the six "flank" goals came from the opponent's right flank. That is, into the zone of Rodina's left-back.
The Spartak match showed the second mechanism in its purest form. 26 shots, 2.81 xG, 52 touches in the box, 12 corners — and 2.24 of those 2.81 xG the red-and-whites accumulated from open play, not set pieces. The most dangerous moment of the whole match — 0.683 xG — was the second goal: Djiku's long pass from his own half released Martins, who got away from Fishchenko and found himself in the space vacated by Meshchaninov. Rodina conceded to Rostov in exactly the same way: Kuchaev's pass in behind the defence, Langovich's shot.
The third weak spot is volume. Over five rounds Rodina has allowed opponents 42 corners against 12 of its own. Opponents' combined xG from set pieces: 2.36. It hasn't conceded from a set piece yet, and that's the most fragile streak in the league: it's about to meet a team whose primary way of scoring is the set piece.
The caveat without which all of the above is a lie
The defence that burned against Spartak no longer exists. From round three Díaz rebuilt the line: the centre-back pairing of Križan - Meshchaninov became Tananeev - Meshchaninov, Bessmertny and Goglichidze came in at full-back instead of Sokol and Dyatlov, and the formation changed from 4-2-3-1 to 4-4-2. Artyom Sokol has been out since 31 July with a muscle injury.
So the individual errors of the July match have no bearing on 30 August. But the structural ones do: the low block, the hole behind the left centre-back and the crosses from the right were repeated in rounds 4 and 5, with the new back four already in place. The surnames change; the addresses don't.
Who Baltika needs to shut down
Here's a number that sits awkwardly with 13th place: Rodina has three men in the RPL scoring charts — Maksimenko fourth with three goals, Garibyan and Pozo with two each. Seven of the team's eight goals between three players; the eighth was Sako's own goal. The threat here is not spread across the squad at all.
Artyom Maksimenko. Three goals, a hat-trick against Akron, the team's best for big chances created. Switches flanks during the game: against Spartak Díaz moved him to the right in the second half up against Gedson, and Rodina's attacks flipped from 54% down the right to 55% down the left. You can't leave him to one wing-back alone.
Iker Pozo. Two goals from deep and the best ratings in the team since round two. He's not a penalty-box player but a second-wave one: the fourth minute against Rostov — arriving to meet a delivery, the 32nd against Dynamo — a shot from outside the box. It's not him you need to shut down but the empty space he arrives into.
Artur Garibyan. Two goals away at Zenit, both after coming off the bench; his August rate is a goal every 37 minutes. He comes on after the 60th minute — exactly where Talalaev makes his double substitution. In short, if Díaz sends on Garibyan after an hour, it's already too late to pretend an ordinary substitute has come on.
Jordy Reyna. 90 minutes in every match, corner duties and two chances created against Spartak. He can't be allowed to receive the ball between the lines in comfort.
But more important than the surnames are the zones. Rodina's main source of goals is quick attacks after the opponent's turnovers: Pozo's goal against Dynamo was born directly from Marinkin's loss of the ball. So the first thing Baltika needs to lock down is its own midfield. The second is Rodina's left corridor: 40% of attacks, against 23.4% through the centre.
What barely needs shutting down at all, meanwhile, is the opponent's set pieces: 0.37 xG from dead balls over five rounds and 12 corners of its own against 42 conceded. This is the only team in the league whose dead balls can be consciously traded off for resources against transitions.
There is, though, one man who can't be shut down at all: Sergei Volkov has made 29 saves in five matches and twice topped the RPL for saves in a game. So Baltika will need more shot volume than usual — one good set piece may not be enough here.
What to watch in Khimki
First: which flank Baltika will load. Its attacks are distributed almost symmetrically — 35.4% left, 35.4% right, 29.2% through the centre — meaning the direction is chosen, not what's left over. The right corridor leads into Rodina's most battered zone.
Second: how many times the ball gets into the opposition box from a static situation. Talalaev's team averages 4.8 accurate crosses per match (fifth in the league) and 28.6 accurate long balls (fourth). Díaz's team: 42 corners conceded in five rounds.
Third: who ends up with the ball at 0:0. If possession falls to Baltika, the Rubin-match scenario kicks in: lots of ball, minimal threat from open play and everything staked on a throw-in or a corner near the opposition box. It's worth saying straight away: in that scenario Baltika took a point last round — it's a signature tool.
Baltika has learned to win matches without the ball and without pretty positional attacks — and that's its strength, not its misfortune. Rodina has learned to score in matches where it's being run ragged. In Khimki two teams meet, each knowing exactly what it's good at, and we'll happily watch to see who beats whom =)
