Opening
There are matches after which the numbers and the emotions diverge so sharply that you have to choose what to believe. Baltika vs Rubin was exactly that. By feel: an anniversary show in the stands, a heroic late siege, a goal in the 94th minute. By the data: over 90 minutes the team produced 0.18 xG from open play, split almost evenly between the halves, 0.10 before the break and 0.08 after. Everything else was set pieces and a Pospelov cross.
The round-five match in Kaliningrad ended 1:1: Siwe scored in the 8th minute, Varatynov equalised in the 94th. For Rubin it was a third straight draw by the same score. Baltika had lost three home games in a row to Kazan 0:1, a historically awkward opponent, so for us this counts as a small step forward.
