An Honest Berdiýew Disappointed to Not Get Three Points

Rubin manager Gurban Berdiýew

The day after Rubin drew at home with Internazionale in Champions League, coach Gurban Berdiýew is realistic about the result’s implications.

You can read his translated comments here, but he echoes what RFN has said about the match.

While Berdiýew was generally “quite satisfied with the performance of [his] defence,” he rues not getting a second goal, realizing the opportunity lost when Internazionale’s Mario Balotelli was dismissed: “we failed to pick up the full three points, although we had an extra man on the pitch.

“Our finishing was simply not good enough. [Aleksandr] Ryazantsev, [Sergei] Semak and [Aleksandr] Bukharov could, and should, have scored. I am a bit disappointed that we failed to score a second goal.”

It is always refreshing to see a manager has a grasp on the situation. Rubin is in a bad place if their goal is to finish in the group’s top two. Based on these comments, Berdyev realizes this and will be able to communicate that to his team. That is unlikely to be enough to help Rubin recover, but it will prevent the club from going to Milan and thinking that one point is a good result.

But, it seems Berdiýew realized these tasks before the match:

“Ahead of the game, we were aware that a draw would do nothing for our chances of progressing to the knock-out stage. That is why we were winding the players up for a victory.”

Rubin played well, but the victory did not come. Now, advancing is improbable, though not impossible. At least Berdiýew is honest about the road ahead.