Orenburg

Orenburg endured a very difficult last season in which they started slowly and ever really recovered and stood a realistic chance of beating the drop, even if they play time some decent football on quite a few occasions in the spring. They were also unlucky at times during the campaign and at the end it seemed like they will be heading back to the second division after two years. However, as it turns out, the Blues have been handed a reprieve just a week before the start of the new season as they will remain in the Premier League in the place of Torpedo Moscow, who finished second and got promoted automatically last season but have subsequently been found guilty of bribing referees to influence their games and have been handed a massive fine along with suspension of their licence for the top-flight. This means that Orenburg are going to start preparing for games against Zenit and CSKA in just a short while instead of SKA, Chaika and KamAZ. Naturally their transfer activity in the summer was positioned in the context of playing a particular level of opponent - targeting young unproven players from the second division. They will now have to refocus their efforts quickly and find some real experience and quality at this level after parting ways with strong players like Gabriel Florentin, Brian Mansilla and Maksim Sidorov. Yet writing this team off as a sure-fire relegation fodder is quire premature as they are likely to play with quite a lot of spirit and togetherness under Vladimir Slijskovic and do have their chances to stay up as long as they get goon early on.