Euro 2012 Team Guide: Russia

Road to Euro 2012
Russia's qualifying campaign was as low key as they come, and their statistics will have "unders" punters salivating. Only three of their matches breached the 2.5 goal line, with one of those being a predictable home hammering of Andorra in Moscow. The match between Russia and Greece is already being tipped as the rock solid under 2.5 goal bet of the tournament. It was Russia's inability to break down well-organised and uninspired defences that was the most notable thing to take from their qualifying campaign. Beaten 1-0 at home by Slovakia, they failed to score in Armenia, could only draw at home with the Republic of Ireland, and scored two in Andorra and one in Macedonia. They scored 12 goals in three of their qualifying matches, and just five in the other seven. Then again, the last time that they played Czech Republic (at Euro 96) the match finished 3-3, in their most recent meeting against Poland it was 2-2 and they and Greece even produced a 1-1 draw in a friendly last year. So the nature of their opponents may mean that they buck a trend, but somehow I doubt it.

The Manager
Dick Advocaat has had two years to make his mark with the Russian national side, and this is our first chance to see if he can inspire them to the sort of European success that he managed with Zenit St Petersburg. This will be Advocaat's one and only shot at a major tournament with Russia, as he will leave them at the end of the summer to take over at his old club PSV Eindhoven. This is Advocaat's sixth time in charge of a national team, and his record at the big tournaments isn't bad. He took Netherlands to the quarter finals of the 1994 World Cup and then went to the semis of Euro 2004 with them in his second spell in charge. His only failure was with South Korea, when he couldn't get them out of the group stage at the 2006 World Cup. His record with Russia is pretty good: unbeaten in his last 11 games, but will he be good enough to get the best out of a tired looking and uninspiring set of players? Needs to "do a Rehhagel" if Russia have any chance of justifying a pre tournament price of 32.031/1.

The Star
Finding a star in a team which is so short on star quality is difficult, and lazy eyes will swiftly rest upon the joint top scorers in qualifying, Roman Pavlyuchenko and Alan Dzagoev. But even though Pavel Pogrebnyak might not have set the tournament alight, he has shown glimpses during his time at Fulham that he might have rekindled the fire that burned when he was at Zenit St Petersburg. Pogrebnyak scored six times in 12 starts for Fulham, and while you could argue that he lost form towards the end of the season, he's the closest thing that Russia have to a star. His international record is a little disappointing, with only eight goals in 31 matches, but injuries have had something to do with that, and in an uninspiring looking forward line, he's the most likely source of goals.

The Rock
The Berezutsky twins often live up to their rather cruel "wooden soldier" nickname, and so Russia's real rock is their goalkeeper Igor Akinfeev. He's been out for nearly a year after a cruciate ligament injury, but is ready to return in place of Vyacheslav Malafeev who played in the last four qualifying games. Akinfeev has always been a much coveted 'keeper, and can count Sir Alex Ferguson amongst his fans. His style is reminiscent of Iker Casillas, and you can be confident that he and his backline can do their job of keeping teams out. The question marks are at the other end of the field.

The Youngster
Finding a Russian youngster about whom to wax lyrical is another difficult task, as there seems to be so little talent coming through at the moment. This will be a problem for future managers, and we could soon be facing the odd prospect of the likes of Armenia, Macedonia and Estonia temporarily overtaking Russia as the region's bigger footballing forces. The only player who fits the bill is the aforementioned Dzagoev, but I'm not a huge fan of his, as I feel that he can drift in and out of games and underwhelm with his attitude. So, I'm sort of leaving this section blank, just to make a point.

The Bet
This is a competitive group, and while Russia have the obdurate quality to grind their way as far as the semi-finals, there's also a case to be made for them crashing out early. I think that the most interesting way to make money out of Russia is to focus on their lack of ability in front of goal. You sometimes can struggle for liquidity in these smaller markets, but in major tournaments there's a good chance of getting a price matched. I'd be looking to back them in the Team Specials>Group Goals Scored, area of Betfair. Under 3.5 goals there could be available at an enticing price.

What the Opta stats say:

Russia were one of the surprise teams in the last edition of the tournament back in 2008, reaching the semi-finals before losing to eventual winners Spain.

Russia failed to score more than one goal in six of their 10 qualifiers.