After his first start and full 90' for Zenit in the Russian Cup against Volgar in a 4-0 victory, Claudio Marchisio made his first official start in the Russian Premier League today, Sunday, September 30th against FC Anzhi Makhachkala.
A match that ended in a 2-1 defeat for the Lvi, Il Principino scored his first goal for the club: slowly fitting perfectly into his new adventure and reality after what felt like a lifetime at Juventus, he opened the scoring in the 47' taking advantage of a rebound and striking a volley into an open net. He was then substituted in the 61' for striker Aleksandr Kokorin in an attempt to score a second and winning goal. However, the exact opposite occurred. Shortly after the #10's substitution, Anzhi levelled the score in the 71' off a goal from Andrés Ponce before Vladislav Kulik converted a penalty in the 83'. Despite being in numerical superiority with Anzhi's Dmitry Belorukov being sent off in the 76', Zenit could not find a way through and lost by a scoreline of 2-1.
Playing alongside former Roma midfielder Leandro Paredes in a 4-4-2 formation, Marchisio's experience and expertise were clearly missing when he came off the pitch, something that manager Sergei Semak will have to take into consideration as his team seemed to lose concentration.
A first and surprising loss for the Sine-Belo-Golubye, they remain in first place with 7W-1D-1L; a total of 22 points after 9 matches.
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