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Russian Premier League

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Russian Premier League
File:SOGAZ-RFPL.png
Founded2001
CountryRussia Russia
ConfederationUEFA
Number of teams16
Level on pyramid1
Relegation toNational League Championship
Domestic cup(s)Russian Cup
International cup(s)Champions League
Europa League
Current championsZenit St. Petersburg
(2010 season)
Most championshipsSpartak Moscow (9 titles)*
Websitehttp://www.rfpl.org
Current: 2011–12 Russian Premier League
 * Incl. Rus. Top League and Rus. Top Division titles

The Russian Premier League (Russian: Российская футбольная премьер-лига), currently called SOGAZ Russian Football Championship (Russian: СОГАЗ — Чемпионат России по футболу) due to sponsorship reasons, is the top division of Russian football. There are 16 teams in the competition. The league has three Champions League qualifying places given to teams who finish in the top three at the end of the season and two Europa League places to teams who finish fourth and fifth. Relegation to the National League Championship are given to teams who finish bottom and second-bottom at the end of the season. The Russian Premier League was established in 2001 and succeeded the Top Division, the difference being that the Top Division was run by the Professional Football League of Russia, and the creation of the Premier League gave the clubs a greater degree of independence.

The Russian league has improved considerably of late, and the Russian Premier League is now ranked 7th by UEFA.

FC Zenit Saint Petersburg are the current Russian Premier League champions.

History

After the break-up of the Soviet Union, starting in 1992, each former Soviet republic organized an independent national championship. In Russia, the six Russian teams who had played in the Soviet Top League in 1991 (CSKA Moscow, Spartak Moscow, Torpedo Moscow, Dynamo Moscow, Spartak Vladikavkaz, and Lokomotiv Moscow) were supplemented with 14 teams from lower divisions to organize a 20-team Russian Top Division. The Top Division was further divided into two groups to reduce the total number of matches. The number of teams in the Top Division was gradually reduced to 18 in 1993 and 16 in 1994. Since then, the Russian Top Division (and subsequently the Premier League) has consisted of 16 teams, except for a short-lived experiment with having two more teams in 1996 and 1997.

Spartak Moscow was the dominant force in the Top Division, winning nine of the first ten titles. Spartak-Alania Vladikavkaz was the only team which managed to break Spartak's dominance, winning the Top Division title in 1995.

Lokomotiv Moscow won the title twice, and CSKA Moscow three times.

In 2007, Zenit St. Petersburg climbed to the top, winning the title for the first time in their history in Russian professional football; they had also won a Soviet title in 1984. 2008 brought the pinnacle of the rise of Rubin Kazan, a club entirely new to the Russian top flight, as it had never even competed in the Soviet Top League.

Competition

Russian Premier League match between Zenit and Dynamo (the last Zenit match at the Kirov Stadium, stadium had been already partially demolished. The stadium will be called "Gazprom Arena")

Teams in the Russian Premier League play each other twice, once at home and once away, for a total of 30 matches. Three points are awarded for a win, one for a draw, and none for a loss. If teams are level on points, the tie-breakers are the number of wins, then the goal difference, followed by several other factors. If the teams are tied for the first position, the tie-breakers are the number of wins, then head-to-head results. If the teams tied for the first place cannot be separated by these tie-breakers, a championship play-off is ordered.

Russian Premier League match between Lokomotiv and Spartak at the Lokomotiv Stadium

As of 2010, the champions and the runners-up qualify for the UEFA Champions League group stage. The third-placed team qualifies for the Champions League second qualifying round. The fourth- and fifth-placed teams qualify for the UEFA Europa League. The bottom two teams are relegated to the First Division (renamed the National League Championship starting in 2011).

Unlike most other European football leagues, the league traditionally ran in summer, from March to November, to avoid playing games under the cold and snowy weather in winter. This will be altered ahead of the 2012/13 season, with the league planning to run the season from autumn to spring. The transitional season of the competition began in early 2011 and will continue until summer of 2012. After the 16 Premier League teams have played each other twice over the course of the year 2011, they will be split into two groups of eight, and the teams will play other teams in their groups two more times for a total of 44 games (30 in 2011 and 14 in 2012). Those two groups will be contested in spring 2012, with the top eight clubs playing for the title and European places. The other sides will vie to avoid relegation: the bottom two will go down while the next two play off against the sides third and fourth in the National League Championship, with the two losers being demoted (or denied promotion).[1]

Youth championship

The Youth championship (Russian: Молодежное первенство), also known as Youth teams championship (Russian: Первенство молодёжных команд), Reserve team tournament (Russian: Турнир среди дублирующих составов) or Reserves tournament (Russian: Турнир дублёров), full name Youth football championship of Russia among teams of clubs of the Premier League (Russian: Молодёжное Первенство России по футболу среди команд клубов Премьер-Лиги), is a league that runs in parallel to the Russian Premier League and includes the youth or reserve teams of the Russian Premier League teams. The number of players a team can have on the pitch at a time that are over 21 years of age or without a Russian citizenship is limited. 16 teams participate in the league. Matches are commonly played a day before the match of the senior teams of the respective teams. All of the Russian Premier League teams are obliged to have a youth team that would participate in the Youth championship. The teams that are promoted from the National League Championship and do not have a youth team must create one. The teams in the league are not relegated based on their final league position, but on the league position of their respective clubs' senior teams.

It has to be noted however that some Premier League clubs have three teams. Apart from the senior team and the team that plays in the Youth championship a team might have another senior team that plays in a lower division of Russian football and serves as the farm team for the main team. Some examples include Lokomotiv-2, and Rubin-2, playing in the Russian Second Division. Also of note is that for example Lokomotiv-2 has a youth team of its own, participating in the Amateur Football League. So a total of 4 teams for Lokomotiv: Premier League, Youth Championship, Second Division and Amateur League.

Youth Champions since 2001

2011–12 clubs

The following teams are confirmed to compete in the 2011–12 season:

Champions and top scorers

Season Champion Runner-up 3rd position Top scorer
1992* Spartak Moscow Alania Vladikavkaz Dynamo Moscow Azerbaijan Veli Kasumov (Dinamo Moscow, 16 goals - 1-8 place)
Russia Yuri Matveyev (Uralmash, 20 goals - 9-20 place)
1993* Spartak Moscow (2) Rotor Volgograd Dynamo Moscow Russia Victor Panchenko (KamAZ Naberezhnye Chelny, 21 goals)
1994* Spartak Moscow (3) Dynamo Moscow Lokomotiv Moscow Russia Igor Simutenkov (Dinamo Moscow, 21 goals)
1995* Alania Vladikavkaz Lokomotiv Moscow Spartak Moscow Russia Oleg Veretennikov (Rotor Volgograd, 25 goals)
1996* Spartak Moscow (4) Alania Vladikavkaz Rotor Volgograd Russia Aleksandr Maslov (Rostselmash, 23 goals)
1997* Spartak Moscow (5) Rotor Volgograd Dynamo Moscow Russia Oleg Veretennikov (Rotor Volgograd, 22 goals)
1998** Spartak Moscow (6) CSKA Moscow Lokomotiv Moscow Russia Oleg Veretennikov (Rotor Volgograd, 22 goals)
1999** Spartak Moscow (7) Lokomotiv Moscow CSKA Moscow Georgia (country) Georgi Demetradze (Alania Vladikavkaz, 21 goals)
2000** Spartak Moscow (8) Lokomotiv Moscow Torpedo Moscow Russia Dmitri Loskov (Lokomotiv Moscow, 18 goals)
2001** Spartak Moscow (9) Lokomotiv Moscow Zenit Saint Petersburg Russia Dmitri Vyazmikin (Torpedo Moscow, 18 goals)
2002 Lokomotiv Moscow CSKA Moscow Spartak Moscow Russia Rolan Gusev (CSKA Moscow, 15 goals)
Russia Dmitri Kirichenko (CSKA Moscow, 15 goals)
2003 CSKA Moscow Zenit Saint Petersburg Rubin Kazan Russia Dmitri Loskov (Lokomotiv Moscow, 14 goals)
2004 Lokomotiv Moscow (2) CSKA Moscow Krylya Sovetov Samara Russia Aleksandr Kerzhakov (Zenit St. Petersburg, 18 goals)
2005 CSKA Moscow (2) Spartak Moscow Lokomotiv Moscow Russia Dmitri Kirichenko (FC Moscow, 14 goals)
2006 CSKA Moscow (3) Spartak Moscow Lokomotiv Moscow Russia Roman Pavlyuchenko (Spartak Moscow, 18 goals)
2007 Zenit Saint Petersburg Spartak Moscow CSKA Moscow Russia Roman Pavlyuchenko (Spartak Moscow, 14 goals)
Russia Roman Adamov (FC Moscow, 14 goals)
2008 Rubin Kazan CSKA Moscow Dynamo Moscow Brazil Vágner Love (CSKA Moscow, 20 goals)
2009 Rubin Kazan (2) Spartak Moscow Zenit Saint Petersburg Brazil Welliton (Spartak Moscow, 21 goals)
2010 Zenit Saint Petersburg (2) CSKA Moscow Rubin Kazan Brazil Welliton (Spartak Moscow, 19 goals)
* The league was named Top League
** The league was named Top Division
Zenit players celebrating their 2007 triumph
Club Winners Runners-Up Years Won
Spartak Moscow
9
4
1992, 1993, 1994, 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001
CSKA Moscow
3
5
2003, 2005, 2006
Lokomotiv Moscow
2
4
2002, 2004
Zenit St. Petersburg
2
1
2007, 2010
Rubin Kazan
2
2008, 2009
Alania Vladikavkaz
1
2
1995
Rotor Volgograd
2
Dynamo Moscow
1

UEFA Ranking

National League Ranking at the ending of the 2010 season

(see UEFA coefficients full list for more information)

All-time table

As of beginning of 2011/12 season
Rank Club1 Seasons Spells Most
recent
season		 Played2 Won Drawn Lost Goals Points3 Gold Silver Bronze
1 Spartak Moscow 19 1 579 328 146 105 1123-586 1130 9 4 2
2 Lokomotiv Moscow 19 1 579 293 161 125 869-526 1040 2 4 4
3 CSKA Moscow 19 1 579 290 140 149 913-566 1010 3 5 2
4 Dynamo Moscow 19 1 578 239 169 170 814-661 886 - 1 4
5 Zenit Saint Petersburg 16 2 488 218 140 130 715-515 794 2 1 2
6 Krylya Sovetov Samara 19 1 582 193 156 233 649-750 735 - - 1
7 Torpedo Moscow 15 1 2006 462 182 131 149 597-553 677 - - 1
8 Alania Vladikavkaz 15 2 2010 459 175 102 182 604-610 627 1 2 -
9 FC Rostov 17 3 518 139 154 225 539-728 571 - - -
10 Rotor Volgograd 13 1 2004 402 151 109 142 562-506 562 - 2 1
11 Saturn Moscow Oblast 12 1 2010 360 120 121 119 396-378 481 - - -
12 Rubin Kazan 8 1 240 111 66 63 338-230 399 2 - 2
13 FC Moscow 9 1 2009 270 92 83 95 295-311 359 - - -
14 Shinnik Yaroslavl 10 4 2008 304 85 86 133 294-403 341 - - -
15 Chernomorets Novorossiysk 8 2 2003 248 74 65 109 274-357 287 - - -
16 Lokomotiv Nizhny Novgorod 8 2 2000 248 68 63 117 233-356 267 - - -
17 Amkar Perm 7 1 210 61 70 79 187-236 253 - - -
18 Zhemchuzhina Sochi 7 1 1999 222 61 57 104 263-390 240 - - -
19 Tom Tomsk 6 1 180 56 52 72 189-222 220 - - -
20 Uralmash Yekaterinburg 5 1 1996 158 57 33 68 215-241 204 - - -
21 Energia-Tekstilshchik Kamyshin 5 1 1996 158 53 43 62 172-177 202 - - -
22 Spartak Nalchik 5 1 150 47 44 59 168-179 185 - - -
23 KAMAZ Naberezhnye Chelny 5 1 1997 162 51 32 79 198-253 1794 - - -
24 Uralan Elista 5 2 2003 150 36 39 75 138-225 147 - - -
25 Anzhi Makhachkala 4 2 120 36 34 50 123-147 142 - - -
26 Luch-Energia Vladivostok 4 2 2008 124 34 32 58 116-187 134 - - -
27 Baltika Kaliningrad 3 1 1998 98 30 37 31 114-111 127 - - -
28 Fakel Voronezh 4 3 2001 124 31 29 64 101-175 122 - - -
29 Terek Grozny 4 2 120 31 28 61 109-174 1155 - - -
30 Kuban Krasnodar 4 4 120 23 40 57 100-184 109 - - -
31 Dynamo Stavropol 3 1 1994 94 27 23 44 94-125 104 - - -
32 FC Tyumen 5 3 1998 154 25 26 103 116-326 101 - - -
33 Okean Nakhodka 2 1 1993 64 22 14 28 65-83 80 - - -
34 FC Khimki 3 1 2009 90 17 23 50 86-151 74 - - -
35 Asmaral Moscow 2 1 1993 60 19 11 30 74-102 68 - - -
36 Sokol Saratov 2 1 2002 60 17 13 30 55-87 64 - - -
37 Lada Togliatti 2 2 1996 64 10 16 38 42-105 46 - - -
38 Sibir Novosibirsk 1 1 2010 30 4 8 18 34-58 20 - - -
39 Volga Nizhny Novgorod - - - - - - - - - - - -
40 FC Krasnodar - - - - - - - - - - - -
  1. For clubs that have been renamed, their name at the time of their most recent season in the Premier League is given. The current members are listed in bold.
  2. Includes championship play-offs.
  3. For the purposes of this table, each win is worth 3 points. The three-point system was adopted in 1995.
  4. KAMAZ-Chally were deducted 6 points in 1997.
  5. Terek were deducted 6 points in 2005.

Champions (Players)

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