We have rounded up the key stats and figures from matchday 23 of the Russian Premier Liga.

Two - Wendel struck twice in spectacular fashion to register his first Russian Premier Liga goals since his move last summer. His double set the champions on their way to a crucial win away to CSKA Moscow, who had taken the lead through former Zenit striker Salomon Rondon just before the half-hour mark. Not only were they his first two goals in Russia, it was also the first time in his professional career when he scored twice in one match.

Four - Marko Nikolic has revived Lokomotiv beyond recognition since the winter break ended, guiding his side to four consecutive wins and back to third place after a 1-0 win away to Ufa on matchday 23. It is the longest current winning streak in the RPL. If they manage to beat bottom side Rotor Volgograd - who sacked manager Aleksandr Khatskevitch this week - on matchday 24, they will equal their longest winning run in Russian league football since 1999, when they finished runners up to Spartak.

Four - Rostov’s thumping 4-0 win represented the club’s biggest away win in the RPL in over four years. Back in 2017 they were 6-0 winners against Tom Tomsk, who named current Spartak Moscow striker Aleksandr Sobolev in their starting lineup for only his second ever professional appearance. Despite being as visitors, Rostov played against Tom at home Olimp-2 stadium. In the previous RPL seasons the Yellow-Blues defeated opponents with 4-0 score for four times, and all matches took place in Rostov-on-Don.

Six - Reziuan Mirzov opened the scoring from the penalty spot for Khimki in their 3-1 win away to Rubin Kazan, making it his sixth goal in 11 games since starting his loan spell. This equals his highest personal goals tally for a season, a mark he set while playing for Arsenal Tula in the 2018/19 season. He has now notched up 16 career RPL goals - 14 of them have come while playing on loan (six more for Arsenal in 2018/19, and two for Tosno in 2017/18), one more was scored in Torpedo Moscow and another in Spartak.

13 - Spartak Moscow stamped their electric form with another high-scoring win this week, thrashing Ural Ekaterinburg 5-1 at home to make it three wins - and 13 goals scored - from their last three league games. The last time they managed to score that many goals in just three matches came back in 1998 when they hammered Litex Lovech 6-2 in the Champions League, drew 1-1 with Baltika Kaliningrad before destroying Tyumen - who went on to set the Russian top-flight record for lowest points total with just eight that season - 7-0.

16 - Igor Akinfeev has made a habit of setting records in his remarkable career, and he set another one in his side’s 3-2 home defeat to Zenit when he saved Artem Dzyuba’s soft spot kick. It was the 16th penalty save in Russian league history, the most of any one keeper. His first came all the way back in 2003 on his debut for CSKA away to Krylia Sovetov Samara. For Dzyuba it signalled the first time in his career that he had missed three penalties in one league season, after spot-kick failures against Krasnodar in November and in the ninth minute of added time, with the last kick of the match, against Rubin on matchday 21.

32 - Thirty-two goals were scored over the eight fixtures on matchday 23, making it the highest scoring matchday of the season so far. Six teams (Rostov, Zenit, Spartak, Dynamo, Khimki and Sochi) scored at least three goals, while two teams - CSKA Moscow and Krasnodar scored twice after taking the lead, and still lost. 

Photo: Konstantin Tverdovsky/Dynamo Moscow; Denis Tyrin/CSKA Moscow