Footballers of Sheriff and Zimbru played a spectacular match in Tiraspol // Foto: fc-sheriff.com
The capital club defeated Wasps 3-2. Zimbru’s Victor Styne, who returned to the club this summer, opened the scoring in the 8th minute. Sheriff’s Albanian international Amarildo Joni equalized the score in the 25th minute, but a double by Zimbru’s Ukrainian forward Alexey Shebetun in the 42nd and 70th minutes allowed Oleg Kubarev’s wards to set a two-goal margin. Sheriff’s forward Vyacheslav Kozma’s goal to Julian-Sebastian Agaki in the first minute of the second half was the last goal of the match, which was sensationally won by the club from Chisinau.
The head coach of Zimbru, Belarusian specialist Oleg Kubarev was satisfied with the performance of his wards in the away meeting with the leader of the championship. “We wanted to postpone this meeting, but, unfortunately, we were not favored. It was doubly hard for us to play, given that we had just returned from an away game (three days before the match in Tiraspol, Zimbru met Astana in Kazakhstan in the second qualifying round of the Europa League and played 1:1 – author’s note), were focused on victory and kept in mind, let’s say, the most important match of the month (meaning the return meeting with Astana in Chisinau – author’s note). Therefore, I am glad that the guys coped, found the resources to fight on the field…. As for the opponent, “Sheriff” sets the tone in the championship. But, as I saw, they also faced certain problems, not all the players of their main squad were able to play, rotation was carried out. I would like to note the beautiful field. On such fields you want to play!” – said the Bison coach at the post-match conference.
Viktor Mikhailov, the coach of “Sheriff”, was a little wordy. He apologized to the fans of the Tiraspol club for the failed, in his words, match and admitted his mistake that led to this result. “We need to get off our knees and move on,” he concluded.
The referee Roman Zhitari (Chisinau) served the match in Tiraspol, assisted in the field by Victor Licica (Ialoveni) and Anatoly Basiul (Chisinau). Sheriff players received four warnings during the match (Conan Jores-Ulrich Lucu, Ibraima Souma, Amarildo Gioni and Peter Ademo), while Zimbru only showed a yellow card to goalkeeper Iulian-Sebastian Agaki.
This match in Tiraspol was the best attended in the current Super League season. There were 3.400 spectators on the stands. According to Sheriff’s press service, earlier, the largest number of spectators came to the meeting with Spartanii-Sportul (Chisinau) in the second round (5:1). Then the match was attended by 3.167 fans. The first round match between “Milsami” and “Zimbru” in Orhei completes the top three most attended matches, with 2,000 people in the stands.
The previous time “Zimbru” defeated “Sheriff” away 17 years ago – on March 12, 2008. In that National Division match the only goal was scored by former Zimbru midfielder Andrei Cojocar. Since then, the clubs have played 30 official face-to-face matches on the field in Tiraspol, 23 times the victory was celebrated by Sheriff players, seven meetings ended in a draw.
The scorer’s race in the Moldovan Super League in the season 2024/25 is headed by Amorildo Gioni from “Sheriff” and Marin Caruntu from “Dacia-Buiucani” (Chisinau), who scored 5 goals each (Caruntu 3 – from penalty kicks). Gai Daan from “Zimbru” and Petru Popescu from “Petrocub” (Hincesti) scored four goals each.
