Amur starts pre-season schedule with defeat

Saturday’s only game saw Amur take on VHL outfit AKM Tula. Andrei Martemyanov’s team is still missing several key players and that showed against an opponent at close to full strength.

Amur Khabarovsk 0 AKM Tula 3 (0-0, 0-2, 0-1)

The Tigers have made some exciting signings this summer, with Alex Galchenyuk, Devin Brosseau and Arnaud Durando adding some class to the import slots. However, they were absent today, leaving fellow newbies Oleg Li and Ilya Talaluyev as the only debutants.

Neither team could find the net in the first period. AKM had a sliht edge, but young Amur goalie Viktor Kobozev unscored his potential as a future KHL player with some good saves.

The breakthrough came after the intermission, when a five-on-three power play saw Gleb Petrov put AKM in front. Petrov looks like a handy contributor on the PP: he got a second goal shortly after as the Tigers continued to take penalties.

At the other end, goalie Denis Popov did a good job of protecting his net despite more pressure from Amur. And that was the story of the third period as well: Popov finished with a shut-out, Sergei Lapshin added a third goal for the VHL outfit.