The Old Man and the Sea: Eugene Starikov at Chornomorets

To be fair, there really is a huge difference between making the bench for the top 7-8 teams (all the unwashed Muscovite teams, plus Rubin and Zenit) versus making the bench for the lower half.

Tomsk is one of those well-run, plucky teams in the RPL (Zenit has had horrible luck in Tomsk the last couple of years) that will always kind of be between the bottom 2-3 relegation candidates and the top half. They are punching above their weight this year partly due to being a well coached team and partly due to some absolutely abysmal seasons (so far) by a couple of heavyweights (3 Moscow teams, Loko, Dinamo and Spartak) and a former fringe team that is going broke and flying apart (no pun intended) at the seams (Krilya Sovetov Samara.) Tom' will always be willing to run out cheaper, younger talent they can take out on loan from some of the bigger clubs, because that's one of the reasons they have managed to stay competitive and stay up, instead of throwing money at every 3rd rate Brasilian or Portuguese hack or has-been (ahem, err, Dinamo!) that comes down the turnpike. They are not broke, due to an effective battle plan, but they just cannot compete on a regular basis with the Moscow monied teams, Zenit (which with Gazprom owning the team now throws around more money than the unwashed Muscovites, not often with good results (see: freaking Auxerre)) and the flavors of the month like Rubin and Terek Grozny (I still think over 50% of Terek's games are fixed per orders from the Kremlin.)

RE: Eugene - I watched quite a few of his games with the Zenit youth team (U-21) which won the RPL youth title last season. He looked competent at times, but was competing for time with a couple of big time prospects (Kannunikov, who has now moved up to the bench and a late game offensive/fresh legs substitute for the varsity, and Ignatovich, who led the youth league in goals and has one more year with the U-21s, he'll definitely be with the big boys next season.) He wasn't helped by an injury that kept him out for a good part of the season, and I see he's picked up a niggling injury again with Tomsk.

He's on loan to Tom' right now, but I honestly don't see Zenit recalling him at the end of the year - there's no room for him on the reserve squad, and he's clearly behind Kannunikov and Ignatovich as academy or youth prospects at forward, who will have their own problems finding time behind Kerzhakov, Bukharov, and Lazovich (Lazovich and Bukhariv are new signings this season, both have looked good, Bukharov was a budding stud at Rubin before they got a big money offerthey couldn't refuse.) Most likely he'll either stay at Tomsk with something worked out, but I don't get the feeling that team management really considers him anything more than a squad rotational player, at best - clearly, his usage so far indicates the Tomsk management's feelings about his potential.

He does now have his Russian passport, as I understand, and I don't believe he ever renounced his Ukrainian (by birth) passport - but to be honest, he's not even remotely close to a call up for any team by either country (and neither team, especially Russia, is particularly deep at forward.)

He probably will have the rest of the season to showcase his talents at Tomsk now that Kornilenko is at Rubin, but if he continues to come off the bench, my guess is he'd be better off trying to drop down in the first division (neither of the likely demotees this season, Krilya or Sibir, look like good bets next year) or catch on with one of the likely promotees (Kuban Krasnodar, relegated last season but a decent club, and/or one of the two Nizhny Novgorod teams battling for promotion.)

Honestly? I don't think he's a week in, week out starter in the RPL. I think right now, just for playing time, he'd be better off looking at the 1st division - or trying to catch on with an MLS club somewhere. I seem to recall he may have dissed MLS in the past (not 100% sure, so don't hang me if I'm wrong, just seem to recall a quote from him in the past) and that may not have been a very good idea on his part. He's not an MLS starter either, but I think he'd get more playing time here, as long as he stays away from injury.

As far as an NT callup, from any of the three counties, ever, for Eugene - right now I'd rate it zero percent chance for both Russia and Ukraine, and less than a 5% chance for the US (unless every US forward other than Robbie Findlay fractures their ankles - I'd start myself in front of Findlay, blech). I just don't think he's ever going to be an international level player.

Then again, I've always thought the same of Findlay, and look who got to start 3 WC games. So, WTF do I know?

 

As far as the type of player he is - It is hard for me to categorize him as a player - the trend now in Russia is to develop or cultivate bigger, target forward types like Pavluchenko with Spurs or Pogrebnyak with Stuttgart, rather than some of the smaller goal poaching types (Kerzhakov) or smallish CAM/withdrawn forward types (Arshavin, Izmailov, Sychev). Eugene is none of the above, stylistically, and is on the smallish side, which doesn't help much in this league. He's not blessed with great footspeed, from what I saw, but that may be related to his injury problems - I remember someone who saw him play at Stetson saying he was very quick back then. Before he got hurt last year, he actually pumped in a few goals in a stretch where he showed good goal poaching instinct and decent finishing qualities, but looked rusty and a bit lost after what was about a 6-7 week absence IIRC. He's just one of those players that doesn't do anything exceptionally well or exceptionally poorly. Believe me, I'm not trying to bag on the kid - when he got there, his Russian was self-admittedly pretty rusty from non-use, and I'm sure he got plenty of stick from the other players on the Zenit U-21 team trying to break in as a relative outsider not coming through their Smena Academy (the RPL youth league is a lot of fun to watch, unlike most RPL teams Zenit last year offered archived webcasts of the U-21 games on their website and it is a rough and tumble competition, lemme tell ya.) The kid has a lot of guts venturing out east as he did, of that there's no question. I just don't see a lot more upside to him than he's already shown, and what he as shown so far is skills of a competent RPL role player/bench sub that most likely is playing one division above his skill level.

Correction: Ignatovich was actually loaned to FK Khimki, another Muscovite suburban team that was relegated last season, back in June, and he's played in a few games this season in the 1st division, mostly as a sub. This kid scored 18 times last year for the youth team, I think Eugene managed 5 or 6. A rough comparison, to be sure, but in my mind kind of reinforces my opinion that he's probably playing in one division too high in Russia.