Football experience in Saint Petersburg

It’s known that the Russians consider two cities as capitals of their country. Moscow is business capital and Saint Petersburg is the a cultural one.

During the Soviet era Moscow was also a football capital, but in 21^st century everything has changed.

Zenit was founded in 1925 as a union of two factory teams “Bolshevik” and “Stalinets”. The club was always adored in the city, but wasn’t able to make much of an impact in the Soviet League. This limited success was caused by the supremacy of Moscow during Soviet years in all spheres of life including football. It was just very hard to compete with them even for the huge city like St Petersburg. FC Zenit won the bronze medal in 1980. They reached the Soviet Cup Final and won the Soviet League title in 1984. In 1985 Zenit beat the Soviet Cup holder in the Soviet Super Cup (also called the Season Cup).

Even Moscow is larger and obviously richer megapolis, St Petersburg is a home town of Russian president Vladimir Putin. Thanks to this fact state gas company Gazprom purchased shares of the main football team in the city. Since then we all see a rise of a new super club. After that Gazprom invested over $100 million, buying new players and building the new stadium.

Since then Zenit has become the richest club in former USSR countries. In 2008 they triumphed in the UEFA Cup and UEFA Supercup, during these years they won few league titles and cups. A club from the banks of Neva River keeps attracting all best players from other Russian teams, including Moscow. In most of the games against teams from Moscow they dominate – very opposite to what was happening at Soviet times!

In 2007, the club’s former home base at the Kirov Stadium was demolished, to be replaced with a new stadium built for Zenit, Gazprom Arena. Russia is about to host World Cup in 2018. The future Zenit stadium is going to become one of the main locations for this spectacular event. It will have a capacity of 64,287 spectators.

At the moment Zenit’s home ground is the Petrovsky Stadium in Saint Petersburg. It has a capacity of 21,500. It is a very cosy and pleasant place. During all football matches it’s full and provides outstanding support to their favourite squad. Some of the famous Russian people, like Mikhail Boyarsky, are active Zenit’s supporters.

Gazprom is spending big amounts of money for famous players. Here are some of the names who currently represent St Petersburg squad: Hulk, Danny, Axel Vitsel, Ezequiel Garay, Domenico Criscito. As per information from Transfermarkt total value of players is about 200 million Euros.

Management works on their project in all possible directions. Promotion via internet, communication with fans, modern marketing are only a few of them.

Saint Petersburg has a lot of historical, architectural, art and nature attractions. Zenit is another brilliant in the crown among them. If you decide to visit the city, you can’t miss it!