Russia Vs. Czech Republic, Euro 2012: Halftime Score 2-0 Russia - Is A Rout On?
Well this isn’t very fair. Russia are steamrollering the Czech Republic at the Stadion Miejski, where both Alan Dzagoev and Roman Shirokov have scored. It looks like there could be more to come as well - the Czech defence is something approximating ‘abject’ at the moment and despite things being fairly evenly matched in the midfield, Russia are getting plenty of good chances, and they’ve put enough of them away to take a commanding lead.
The Czechs dominated the early stages of the game but were undone by a simple cross. Konstantin Zyryanov lofted the ball to the unmarked Aleksandr Kerzhakov, whose header beat Petr Cech and crashed off the far post. Unfortunately for the defenders, the ricochet bounced straight to Dzagoev, who finished calmly with the goalkeeper stranded.
It got worse shortly thereafter. A wonderful through ball by Andrei Arshavin confused the Czech back line and allowed Shirokov to nick in late, and the Zenit St. Petersburg midfielder beat Cech with a cool chip to make it 2-0. Russia had more chances to score, so they haven't been hugely clinical, but they're creating enough chances that putting only half of them away is perfectly fine.
At the other end of the pitch, not much is happening. When the Czech Republic have the ball (especially Petr Jiracek), they look dangerous, but there’s been nothing in the way of an end product and Vyacheslav Malafeev’s hardly been tested. A big comeback is required - but we’ve already seen that happen once today. Can lightning strike twice?
We have live coverage of the game in our Russia vs. Czech Republic, Euro 2012 StoryStream. For more on Euro 2012 and the entire world of football, follow @SBNationSoccer on Twitter.
