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Russia Euro 2008 Squad

Russia will be keen to have a lengthy run in the competition and end a long spell without any major silverware in the European Championship. Supporters will fancy their chances of having a successful tournament with coach Guus Hiddink at the helm and his proven track record of doing well in the big international competitions. But Hiddink will want to ignore the record books as Russia have failed to repeat what the former Soviet Union have achieved in the European Championship.

The last time they won the tournament was back in 1960 when they beat Yugoslavia 2-1 in the final. It was to prove a successful period as just four years later the Soviet Union reached the final once again, but lost on that occasion to the hosts Spain 2-1 in front of a 120,000 crowd. The Soviet Union can also boast getting to the final in 1972 and 1988, but lost on both occasions to West Germany and then Holland when Marco van Basten scored a memorable volley.

After the break up of the Soviet Union, Russia reformed and qualified for the tournament in 1996 but failed to make it through the group stages and it has been a similar story ever since. Russia failed to qualify for the competition in 2000 and it did not get much better for them in 2004 when they finished rock bottom of Group A in the finals in Portugal. But following a successful qualifying campaign, Hiddink will have high hopes for his side in Switzerland and Austria this summer.

Despite being drawn in a tough group with Croatia and England, Russia were still able to finish in the top two and overtake England to reach the finals. They may have crashed to a 3-0 defeat at Wembley, but they quickly recovered and came away with a memorable 2-1 victory over England in Moscow to put them in pole position in Group E. Hiddink will be looking to his strike force of Dmitri Sychev and Alexander Kerzhakov to fire the goals which will help them qualify for the knockout stages of the competition.

Russia Euro 2008 Squad

Head coach: Guus Hiddink

No. Pos. Player DoB (Age) Caps Goals Club 1 GK Igor Akinfeev 8 April 1986 (22) 18 0 CSKA Moscow 2 DF Vasili Berezutskiy 20 June 1982 (26) 25 1 CSKA Moscow 3 DF Renat Yanbayev 7 April 1984 (24) 0 0 Lokomotiv Moscow 4 DF Sergei Ignashevich 14 July 1979 (28) 35 3 CSKA Moscow 5 DF Aleksei Berezutskiy 20 June 1982 (26) 30 0 CSKA Moscow 6 FW Roman Adamov 21 June 1982 (25) 1 0 FC Moscow 7 MF Dmitri Torbinsky 28 April 1984 (24) 7 0 Lokomotiv Moscow 8 DF Denis Kolodin 11 January 1982 (26) 10 0 Dynamo Moscow 9 FW Ivan Saenko 17 October 1983 (24) 5 0 Nuremberg 10 FW Andrei Arshavin 29 May 1981 (27) 33 10 Zenit St. Petersburg 11 MF Sergei Semak 27 February 1976 (32) 43 4 Rubin Kazan 12 GK Vladimir Gabulov 19 October 1983 (24) 5 0 FC Kuban 13 FW Pavel Pogrebnyak 8 November 1983 (24) 7 2 Zenit St. Petersburg 14 DF Roman Shirokov 6 July 1981 (26) 1 0 Zenit St. Petersburg 15 MF Diniyar Bilyaletdinov 27 February 1985 (23) 19 1 Lokomotiv Moscow 16 GK Vyacheslav Malafeev 4 March 1979 (29) 15 0 Zenit St. Petersburg 17 MF Konstantin Zyrianov 5 October 1977 (30) 9 0 Zenit St. Petersburg 18 MF Yuri Zhirkov 20 August 1983 (24) 16 0 CSKA Moscow 19 FW Roman Pavlyuchenko 15 December 1981 (26) 14 4 Spartak Moscow 20 MF Igor Semshov 6 April 1978 (30) 23 0 Dynamo Moscow 21 FW Dmitri Sychev 26 October 1983 (24) 37 14 Lokomotiv Moscow 22 DF Aleksandr Anyukov 28 September 1982 (25) 29 1 Zenit St. Petersburg 23 MF Vladimir Bystrov 31 January 1984 (24) 16 2 Spartak Moscow

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Topics: European Championships, Russia