Russia’s Euro 2016 squad announced

Russia Manager Leonard Slutsky has gone straight in with a final squad of 23 players for this Summer’s European Championships and it’s very nearly a throwback to the Soviet Union era with 22 of the 23 players coming from the Russian Premier League.

It’s only Schalke’s Roman Neustadter who comes from outside the Russian League but his story is quite an interesting one and will have also done nothing to help tensions between Russia and Ukraine. Neustadter first represented Germany at youth levels but after being Ukrainian born he looked to represent them at full level.

But Russia never missing an opportunity to inflame relations between themselves and their neighbours then spoke Neustadter themselves and the next thing you know he is now in their final 23 for the trip to France.

Champions League fans will be familiar with such players as Goalkeeper Igor Akinfeev and the Berezutsky siblings in Defence, while the creativity will come from Alan Dzagoev in Midfield.  They look a bit light up front with only 3 strikers selected with Artyom Dzyuba set to be the real danger man

England fans will look at this squad with particular interest what with these two sides meeting in their opening group game on Saturday June 11. Below is the squad in full

Goalkeepers: Igor Akinfeev (CSKA Moscow), Guilherme (Lokomotiv Moscow), Yuri Lodygin (Zenit St. Petersburg).

Defenders: Alexei Berezutsky (CSKA Moscow), Vasily Berezutsky (CSKA Moscow), Sergei Ignashevich (CSKA Moscow), Dmitry Kombarov (Spartak Moscow), Roman Neustadter (Schalke), Georgy Shchennikov (CSKA Moscow), Roman Shishkin (Lokomotiv Moscow), Igor Smolnikov (Zenit St Petersburg).

Midfielders: Igor Denisov (Dynamo Moscow), Alan Dzagoev (CSKA Moscow), Denis Glushakov (Spartak Moscow), Alexander Golovin (CSKA Moscow), Oleg Ivanov (Terek Grozny), Pavel Mamaev (Krasnodar), Alexander Samedov (Lokomotiv Moscow), Oleg Shatov (Zenit St Petersburg), Roman Shirokov (CSKA Moscow).

Forwards: Artyom Dzyuba (Zenit St Petersburg), Alexander Kokorin (Zenit St Petersburg), Fyodor Smolov (Krasnodar)