Why anzhi selling players

And a host of players, foreign and Russian, bought for extravagant fees over the past two and a half years, were to be shipped out post-haste. The football media naturally looks for footballing reasons for Kerimov's sudden about-face - and there are several. After finishing in third place last season, hopes were high of a title push, but Anzhi have begun the campaign in disappointing fashion, losing two and drawing two of their opening four games.

An official statement external-link said as much, stating that "having analysed the club's recent sporting results, the decision has been taken to work on a new long-term strategy for the club". Rumours have been rife of training-ground bust-ups ever since Meulensteen was handed the manager's job just over a fortnight ago.

There are apparent precedents here, with Eto'o's alleged unwillingness to work with previous Anzhi coaches Gadzhi Gadzhiev and Yury Krasnozhan seeing them leave. They finished only third in the Russian championship last season and have just two points from their first four matches this season.

Club chairman Konstantin Remchukov suggested on Twitter that Anzhi planned a fire sale of players to trim costs and would bring back Gadzhi Gadzhiyev, the manager who left the club in September Kerimov bought Anzhi Makhachkala in January and spent heavily to turn the team of his native Dagestan into one of the most ambitious football clubs in Europe.

After finishing in third place last season hopes were high for the Premier League title, but a poor start of the season has destroyed all hopes. The Dagestan team will invest in developing local talent rather than buying stars from outside. The new team will be closer to Dagestan people than all those foreign stars. But leading Russian football pundit Igor Monichev believes that the rules are only part of the problem why FC Anzhi is sinking.

That created a deep gap between them and the rest of the team. Afterwards Traore, Jucilei and Abdul Razak were amongst those sold or let go in January , as the final signings of the rich couple of years were sold off. Carlos was even interim manager during his time with the Russian club who replaced him with Guus Hiddink and the Dutchman was then replaced by Rene Mulensteen but the former Manchester United coach lasted just 16 days before the cuts and was sacked.