Krasnodar rout Yenisei, stay in Champions League hunt

MOSCOW: Krasnodar kept alive their hopes of earning the Russian Premier League's second automatic Champions League place with a confident 4-0 away win at Yenisei Krasnoyarsk on Saturday.

The result left the club from Russia's southern city in third, two points behind second-placed Lokomotiv Moscow with just two games left to play this season.

Zenit St Petersburg, who claimed their fifth Russian title last week, top the table, six points clear of the railway-backed side.

Only freshly crowned champions Zenit and the team that finishes second are assured of a place in the group stage of next season's Champions League, while the third placed finishers go into the third qualifying round.

"It was much harder to win than the scoreline suggests," Krasnodar head coach Murad Musaev said.

"Yenisei are well-organised team but luckily we managed to convert almost all our chances into goals. We played well and won deservedly today."

After the opening half-hour with little in the way of goalmouth action the Swede Viktor Claesson put Krasnodar into the lead in the 31st minute sending the ball into the left post with a low shot from the edge of the penalty box.

Yury Gazinsky netted Krasnodar second five minutes later beating Yenisei 'keeper Yury Nesterenko with an unopposed close-range shot off a Brazilian Wanderson back-heel pass.

Second-half substitutes Ivan Ignatiev and Magomed-Shapi Suleimanov added one apiece after the interval to secure Krasnodar's first away win since October 28.

Elsewhere, Akhmat Grozny edged the visitors Samara 2-1 to go seventh.

Senegalese forward Ablaye M'bengue lifted Akhmat 1-0 up in the third minute with a close-range header.

He netted his second of the match in the 42nd minute but Samara skipper Taras Burlak halved the deficit just two minutes later.