On Saturday afternoon Energetik begin the second half of the Belarusian league campaign at the Borisov arena. We travel there in good spirits after the demolition of an absolutely wretched Slavia Mozyr side in Molodechno. Our hosts, meanwhile, as we shall see, are still licking their wounds after a concerningly poor performance last time out. Despite this, they are top of the table, three points clear of second place Shakhtyor, and four clear of a clutch of clubs, including ourselves, sitting on 26 points. Should Neman Grodno win their game in hand, however, they will be just a point shy of BATE as things currently stand. Can anyone really see the ludicrous yellow and green sticks of rock from the Polish border mounting a serious challenge, however?Borisov is about forty five miles north-east of Minsk. It’s an old city, founded in the early twelfth century by Prince Boris, son of Vseslav the Sorcerer, a descendant of the ruling noble family from Belarus’ oldest city, Polotsk. Other than periodic conflicts the next big thing was the arrival of the railways, then the familiar pattern of destruction, displacement and re-building between 1918-44. Most of the city was destroyed during World War Two and subsequently re-built and industrialised along Soviet lines.
When BATE were one of the very few Belarusian teams folk had heard of in the before-COVID times, everyone assumed that the city, about the size of Middlesbrough, made tractors. Actually, it doesn't. BATE (Borisov Automobile and Tractor Electronics) is an industrial concern that makes motor electronics, for both cars and tractors; the tractors themselves are made at the gigantic MTZ factory in Minsk. The 'Belarus" tractor brand is emblazoned across the front of their shirts (and you can actually buy Belarus tractors in the UK). Geely cars from China are also a big presence in this part of the country, and their logo appears both on BATE and Torpedo’s shirts.
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| [The Wurzels]"Now I've got a brand new BELARUS tractor, and I'll Give you the Keys..."[/The Wurzels] |
There is a long essay to be written on the intertwining of the history of the tractor and the history of post-war football in Belarus. The Minsk plant sponsored the now defunct MTZ-RIPO; a club called Traktor Minsk, a re-formation of an old Soviet team, is playing confidently at amateur level and may well return to the league set ups; FC Minsk and Isloch currently grace the Traktor stadium, in the capital. However readers will be grateful that I shall spare them a painful football / tractor mash-up experience here.
Although Borisov isn't exactly top of the tourist charts in Belarus, there is more to the city than car and tractor parts. It's meant to be quite a green and pleasant place to live in. There's many other Soviet-era industrial parts complexes, food processing, and quite an important base for the Belarusian army- this is an army town as much as a factory town. And there's some remarkable architecture, too, most notably the futuristic Borisov Arena itself.
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| The fabulous Borisov arena, beamed down from outer space in 2014 |
The new stadium, in the hinterland of Borisov between the edge of the town and the surrounding woods, opened in 2014, designed by a Slovenian architectural practice. It's an extraordinary thing outside, a cross between a contemporary art gallery, a 1960s imagining of a spaceship, and a Bond villain complex; this impressions cover a modern arena seating 14,000 inside. The national team plays regularly here and will do so until a new "for free" Chinese-built national stadium opens in Minsk in 2023. At least the football stadium sector of the Belarusian economy is booming.
Failure is Not Acceptable
BATE's season last year was unusual, in that they didn't win the league. Formed in Soviet times, in 1973, the club went into abeyance in the 1980s and re-emerged in independent Belarus. Since then, they have been an unstoppable trophy-winning machine; fifteen league titles, four Belarusian cup wins, seven Belarusian super cup wins. As a result, BATE have the kind of relationship with domestic football that Celtic have with the Scottish Premier League, TNS with the Cymru Premier, or Bayern Munich with the Bundesliga. Were they a British or German club I'm sure fans of all other teams would be united in a detestation of them; as it's Belarus, fan culture is somewhat different. Dinamo Minsk fans apart, there seems to be widespread respect for BATE's achievements as a rare example of a Belarusian footballing institution that can be very successful beyond the country's borders, and a sporting acceptance of the standards that they have set in the past.
However such a history and track record means that success is demanded, rather than merely expected. BATE's failure to take the title last season saw manager Alexei Baga leave the club at the end of 2019. Since then, new coach Kirill Alshevsky, who has been at BATE almost all his working life, has been charged with regaining the crown as a bare minimum expectation. Alshevsky has already re-started the stalled trophy-winning machine this season, in taking the Belarusian cup, albeit with a last gasp winner after two hours of sterile tedium against Dinamo Brest.
Alshevsky is unusual for a top-level coach in that he hardly played the game at all- a brief season at youth side RUOR Minsk in the Second League, before going into management in his early twenties. He has been associated with BATE since 2006, barring a very brief spell as assistant manager at Dinamo Minsk for a handful of games, and built up vast experience managing the national team age groups- under 16s, under 17s, and under-19s. Still not forty, Alshevsky then is a true Belarusian coaching technocrat, with potentially decades ahead of him in the leagues.
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| Head Coach Kirill Alshevsky accepts a manager of the month award at Vitebsk. The award's curse duly struck, BATE throwing away a two-goal lead against Sergei Yasinsky's irritating outfit |
His time at BATE has been not without problems, though. The team looked frankly abysmal in the first fixture against ourselves in Minsk, when we prevailed with a spirited and exciting 3-1 win, and doubled down with another poor display at the Yusnost in Mozyr, losing by the odd goal in three to Slavia, despite leading early on. Such is the expectation in the club that Alshevsky's regime was in deep crisis two games into the season. Aleksandar Hleb, the recently retired BATE legend, made some sympathetic noises in the Belarusian press, saying that the team looked "nervous". A narrow and unconvincing home win against an unambitious, defensive Rukh offered brief respite before another grim performance in Mozyr, this time a 0-1 reverse in the first leg of the cup semi-final.
Fortunately, whenever a coach is looking into the black pit of self-doubting despair, with questioning headlines buzzing around his head like angry hornets, Andrei Razin's abysmal FC Minsk side can make everything go away. The huge flat spot in BATE's carburettor was suddenly overcome, as Alshevsky's side triumphed 3-0 and began a run of thirteen games unbeaten. The semi-final cup deficit against Slavia was overturned at the Borisov arena. Potless Slutsk, beginning to be overwhelmed by financial problems, meekly surrendered to a 0-3 defeat, in what was at the time a top-two clash.
BATE's frailties were exposed by luckless Smolevichi who perhaps deserved better from one of the most entertaining games of the season at BATE's old stadium, with a crazy game seeing the complacent league leaders stagger home 5-3 amidst a fusilade of remarkable goals. But it looked like Alshevsky finally had things licked in the late May double header with old foes Dinamo Brest. Their victory away over the 2019 champions, an assured 3-1 triumph, was one of their best displays of the season, and more like the BATE of old. They were tested severely in the league game, and weathered much pressure, with the hapless Pavel Savitsky missing a crucial chance with twenty minutes remaining, with the scores level. Two clinical late strikes sealed the points for the visitors, and the cup win followed immediately afterwards.
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| BATE win the cup and crow "Always First" on Instagram: Maybe not in the league, though, lads. |
And Yet...
...something's not quite right with this BATE side. In the English-speaking community of Belarusian football fans many have said that BATE will stroll on and win the league easily. I've just never been convinced that they will. There's a fragility about the side, a lack of mental toughness that has been exposed ruthlessly in the last month. If BATE do end up winning the title this season, it will be as much the consequence of the challengers failing to get their act together sufficiently well (Shakhtyor Soligorsk, I'm looking at you) as any qualities BATE themselves may possess. It's also an ageing group, with many key players now the wrong side of thirty, with a period of transition looming, regardless of the final outcome of this season's championship.
The first evidence of this fragility came after BATE began to notch up a few wins. Captain Ihar Staševich gave a bizarre interview in the Belarusian press, throwing down the gauntlet to...Torpedo, Slutsk and ourselves, casting doubt on whether we could sustain our good starts. BATE captains of old simply wouldn't have noticed clubs like ourselves, and this showed how much their poor start to the league season had got to them.
More substantially, BATE have come up short, badly, in two recent key games at the Borisov arena. Firstly, in one of the most anticipated games of the first half of the campaign, they drew 2-2 with Shakhtyor. What was striking about the game was BATE's mental fragility. Shakhtyor led for much of the match, as the tension in the Arena grew rapidly. BATE, remarkably, found the reserves from somewhere to turn it around and lead 2-1 (remember, Shak hadn't conceded for seven matches at that point) but then the collective head was lost when a controversial late equaliser was allowed to stand. The last ten minutes of that game was probably the ugliest atmosphere of the season to date, and BATE lost all nerve and composure. Even although a point was a perfectly reasonable result- Shakhtyor are the chasers in second, after all- the rattiness and petulance was quite something to behold, as coach and players berated the referee at full time. From the neutral point of view, the goal was the right side of legal, so there was a strong whiff of "poor little rich kid" about the protests.
This cracking under pressure was very obvious in last weekend's dire home reverse to Dinamo Minsk- a result that no-one, your humble scribe included, saw coming. What we saw last weekend was a younger coach being tactically schooled by an older rival. Leonid Kuchuk, pacing like a circus ringmaster in his technical area, played every moment with his side, with an incredible intensity and will to win. The contrast in body language with the sullen and silent Alshevsky was worthy of comment in itself. "BRAVO, BRAVO", barked Kuchuk with each tackle and kick of the ball, as silence increasingly descended on the home support.
BATE just couldn't break Dinamo's back four open at all- and again seemed to lose the head completely in the final third of the game, when a quickfire double sent them crashing to a first defeat in thirteen games. Alshevsky had a torrid row with the referee and his assistant was banished to the stands. The more you play mind games with BATE, the better for you. Kuchuk's tactical masterclass also showed that if you can frustrate BATE, they really don't have a Plan B, indicating a tactical rigidity as another area of concern.
Whatever happens at the weekend, I am still far from convinced that this BATE side will win the league. They bear little comparison with the BATE sides that performed creditably in Europe a few years back. They've lost three league games in the first half of the season alone; the last coach was let go having lost only four times throughout the campaign.
Personnel
Of course on paper this is a club that shouldn't be losing to any of their rivals. BATE, as one would expect, have a fine, balanced squad; a player-larder groaning with experienced internationals from home, and young boys from Croatia, Serbia, Montenegro, and Iceland, on their way up.
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| Keeper Anton Chichkan |
Alshevsky is an attacking manager and has played a 4-3-3 system in almost every match this season. His back four is reasonably steady; a centre back pairing of Belarusian Zakhar Volkov, and Croatian international Jakov Filipović, who moved from Belgian side Lokeren at the end of March. Filipović in particular is a composed performer who finds plenty of time for himself on the ball. Volkov, meanwhile, is a folk hero, have bundled the ball in on the cusp of the final whistle, to win the cup for BATE. Another Filipović, the Serbian Aleksandr, is the regular at left back. Dmitri Bessmertnyih can move between right back and right wing back easily, and has turned out ten times between those positions this season.
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| Left back Aleksandr Filipović wins a header against Arsenal at the Emirates. |
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| Stanislav Dragun in Europa League action at Stamford Bridge |
Dragun has been a regular in the international set up for a decade, with sixty six caps and eleven goals under his belt for Belarus. The third component in the midfield trio has flitted between promising young Icelander Willum Thor Willumsson, who's done well every time I've seen him in the highlights,and the experienced Dmitry Baga, brother of the former manager. It's to Baga's credit that he's carried on contributing wholeheartedly, despite what must be a slightly awkward personal position in the squad.
The forward three isn't really too bad either, most weekends. Ihar Staševich also has over fifty Belarusian caps to his name; recently he netted his fifth international goal with a long range effort in Belfast against Northern Ireland. The club captain is lethal from dead ball situations and with shots from distance, and is very hard in the tackle. He's been an ever-present this season and has four goals to his name, two of them absolute pearlers of free kicks. At 34 he's coming to the end of a distinguished career spent overwhelmingly in Borisov, with over 400 games for the club; earlier he spent time at FC Gomel, and Dinamo Minsk. He's been back at BATE since 2015.
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| Ihar Staševich celebrates scoring for Belarus at Windsor Park |
Top scorer for BATE this season is Pavel Nekhajchik, with seven goals in fourteen matches; he was suspended for last weekend's game having accumulated four yellow cards. Having had a slow start to the season he has warmed up with five strikes in his last six appearances, including vital goals in the 3-1 win in Brest, and at home to Shakhtyor. He'll come back into contention for selection this weekend. A final dangerous options is the Serbian stiker Nemanja Milić. Milić, who joined at the beginning of 2019 from Red Star Belgrade, has five goals to his name this season although hasn't quite nailed down a starting berth just yet. A lacklustre showing last weekend against Dinamo won't have helped his cause.
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| Leading scorer Pavel Nekhajchik comes back into contention this weekend |
We've seen the strength in BATE's squad, and for all the doubts about their levels of performance and their mental strength, it's a very good group with great options in every department. Critical to our success on Saturday will be keeping BATE at bay for the first third of the game, testing their patience, and beginning to play on the self-doubts that have crept into their game in the last month.
I hope that the club did appeal Dušan Bakić's red card from last week. if he is missing, that will be a major pity. The big Montenegrin scored the crucial third in the opening day win over BATE in March. If however he is unavailable, there is the possibility of bringing Yudchits back up front with Yakshiboev, or maybe even keeping Yudchits at wing-back and bringing in Sovpel. The obvious Unamrov-for-Sovpel swap with Yudchits going up front is also a possibility, but then Vladimir does like his continuity in the outfield players, and will not want to tinker too much with the winning formula that he discovered so spectacularly last week.
I am expecting an attacking, open game with goals aplenty this week. Both sides enjoy attacking and are set up to do so. We don't have the players or the defensive mindset (thankfully) to go there and do a Dinamo Minsk. I do perhaps worry a little about their front three going up against our back three, so the battle in midfield will be critical with Nosko, Umarov/ Sovpel and Tweh all having vital roles to play. It's also another big opportunity for Yak to add to his growing reputation, after his performance of the season, last week.
Transfermarkt values BATE's squad at £67 million; ours at £2.4 million. The disparities between the clubs are absolutely enormous. So, I see this as a free hit for us. If we lose, well, so what, it's to be expected. But we have shown that we can beat this shaky BATE eleven once before this season and Vladimir and the boys should be going there concentrating only on what they can take from the game in a positive manner. If we go there with no fear we might just have the right to expect something a little better. And it's my birthday, so I'd prefer not to spend part of it watching us get drubbed. No pressure, lads.
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| The Yak and big Junior sprinkle pepper on BATE's cornflakes during our wonderful 3-1 win in mid-March |
Twitter: @jonblackwood
Really good, cheers , lookin forward to the match
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