Leonid Kuchuk: "We played the way we wanted to play"

After the victorious derby against Spartak Moscow, Lokomotiv manager told the press-conference he was happy with how his team performed and said he wasn't surprised by Karpin's top 11.

– Were you lucky today?
– It wasn't luck that helped us. We won due to better physical condition, desire and good tactical skill of our players. If a team don't have all these, luck won't help.

– What's your estimation of Lokomotiv's playing quality?
– We started well and could have scored more than twice before half-time. In the second half we completed what we started before. To score three times in a game like this and be unhappy with the quality - to say this would be stupid.

– Is Spartak's play comfortable for you?
– Spartak rely on ball possession and diagonal passing. But you don't surprise anyone with ball possession these days. It's important to make the opponent open up, to search for spaces. Ball possession for its own sake is useless. You have to score and thus win.

– All three goals were scored after long passes.
– There's a term - lateral-diagonal run. We capitalized on it today. How it works - it's my professional secret. We work on it during training sessions. If Spartak defenders keep allowing the balls behind their backs it's their problem. We played the way we wanted to play and capitalized on what we were going to.

– How did you like it today without the fans?
– For me, only one thing is important - the team must win. You heard my remarks to the players but I stress it: I don't move them like figures in chess, they know how to move. The result is not made during the 90 minutes of the game, it's made during the week before the game, it's made every day during the training sessions.

– Was Movsisyan's appearance a surprise for you?
– Oh, come on. I'm following the teams of the Premier League. That's what a head coach is there for: to tell his team how to play against each and every player of the rivaling team. We have a data base of our rivals, Spartak should have it too. How can anything be surprising for me in these circumstances?