CSKA — Lokomotiv Kuban, 11 September 2024

Returned format

Last year, the VTB League tried to hold the entire tournament in the Final Eight format, but now it has decided to return to the scheme of the season before last. The SuperCup again has six teams, including two foreign, the participants are split into two groups, after which the classification games will take place on Saturday.

CSKA's opponents are Lokomotiv-Kuban and Crvena Zvezda, in the other pool - UNICS, Zenit and Besiktas.

They took a closer look in Turkey

In the first game CSKA will play against Krasnodar tomorrow. The team, which after a successful playoff run in 2023 many consider a main rival for the Muscovites, underwent significant changes in the off-season. The main thing, the coach of the Slovenian national team, Aleksandar Sekulic, was replaced by the president of the club, Andrey Vedishchev. The self-appointment of Andrey Vladimirovich is perhaps the most discussed and unexpected news of the past summer. In the past, the famous ex-player had never worked as a coach, and everyone will follow his debut with double interest.

Vedishchev's idea is to return to the development of players from the club’s youth system, and it gives serious roles for such promising players as Andrey Martyuk, Vladislav Emchenko and Anton Kvitkovskikh, but the foreigners also retain leadership functions. It is important to note the transfer to UNICS of one of the best scorers in the league, Devon Akoon-Purcell, the acquisition of defensive specialist Antonius Cleveland from Maccabi and one of the leaders of Parma, BJ Johnson.

Our team crossed paths with the Krasnodar team in Belek, there the teams played against the same opponents. So the coaching staffs had time to take a closer look and study the opponents.

Derby with friends

Just a day after the meeting with Lokomotiv, the red-blues will face another difficult test. Crvena Zvezda is not just a Euroleague team, but also a very ambitious club that has done everything possible to strengthen its roster in the past offseason. For example, the team has been joined by a triple-double specialist, Cody Miller-McIntyre, who once played well in the VTB League. Two players have returned at once: Nikola Kalinic, a legend of the club and the Serbian National Team, from Barcelona, ​​and sharp-shooter Ognjen Dobric from Virtus.

The confrontation between CSKA and Zvezda is a kind of international derby, a battle of the red-blues against the red-whites. However, in our particular case, there are much more friendly ties than any kind of enmity. Belgrade head coach Giannis Sfairopoulos, athletic trainer Vladan Radonjic and physiotherapist Todor Galic worked in the CSKA staff, Milos Teodosic, Dejan Davidovac and Joel Bolomboy playing for the team.

The main thing is that all the Belgrade stars get to Moscow. By the way, they will have a difficult journey: today the team played a closed friendly game with Olympiakos in Piraeus, and tomorrow they will fly to Russia via Istanbul.

Everyone is in place

The CSKA team returned from Antalya on Sunday, practiced in Krylatskoye on Monday (without Aleksa Avramovic, who went home for his brother's wedding), and on Tuesday they were already working on the VTB Arena parquet in full force. Yuri Umrikhin, who spent the Turkish training camp recovering from an injury, returned to the team.

A special guest was also present at the practice session – the former head coach of the team, Dimitris Itoudis, who flew to the tournament at the invitation of the league. The Greek specialist was received warmly, because most of the team and staff worked with him and achieved great victories.

“We start the Supercup with a game against one of the top teams of the VTB League,” CSKA head coach Andreas Pistiolis said. “We can expect a physical game against a very aggressive and talented team. It will be interesting and good test for us to see where we stand at the moment.”