Congratulations on reaching the RPL Path final! Can you give us a few words about the game?
It was a good match, we really wanted to progress to the next stage. The first leg gave us an important advantage and today we played some good football. With God's help we did what we needed to do.
Zenit played an intense attacking game from the first minute. What was the plan for the game?
We wanted to put the game beyond doubt as quickly as possible, we always try to do this. We had to forget about the result in Moscow and try to get a win and score some goals. We created a lot of chances, but didn’t find the net. There seemed to always be something just stopping the goal from being scored.
Why couldn’t Zenit win today?
The Spartak goalkeeper had an excellent game and made a number of very good saves, some of them were absolutely incredible. The final score is really down to him. Some of the chances we weren’t accurate enough with and in others we should have played them better. The most important thing is that we created a lot of chances.
Today you were close to scoring twice, with a traditional central defender’s header from a corner kick, but also with an overhead shot. Do you often do this?
Yesterday in training I had a shot like this. The coach saw this and then showed me a video of himself scoring with a bicycle kick. It must have stayed in my mind and when the ball came in the box. I had time to think about it and decided take a shoot that way. If I had scored, it would have been an amazing and special goal for me! I hope I can do this next time.
Zenit today supported World Autism Awareness Month, why is it important to talk about autism?
Because all people, regardless of who they are, have the right to live a full life. No one should be excluded from society.
