Last game of the season – looking toward the future.

   

     On Thursday Shakhter Karagandy will play their last game of the season against Maccabi Haifa. With both teams not having any chance of going through to the knockout round, the boys will play for money (winner gets 200 000 euro, split in event of a draw) and UEFA coefficient points for both Shakhter and Kazakhstan. Thanks mostly to Shakhter’s European play, Kazakhstan has moved up 4 positions in the UEFA country coefficient table, now in 34th place, ahead of Bosnia and behind Georgia. Shakhter meanwhile has moved up to the grand position of being the 246th best club in Europe, about 50 spots behind the leading Kazakhstani club Aktobe who sitting in 191st position.

Certainly not considered a top European club, but Shakhter has gained some legitimacy on the European stage. Beating Celtic at home and drawing with AZ turned some heads and raised eyebrows. This season showed that Kazakh teams are no pushovers and are able put up a fight against top teams. In fact, Shakhter gained a reputation and got its name around, which will certainly help make signing new players that much easier. Looking toward the off-season many have speculated that Shakhter will use this year’s prize money to acquire a (relatively) big name player from a foreign competition. This is all speculation, but I will be very surprised if Shakhter does not bring in someone big this off-season. Especially with the departure of R. Cañas and S. Khizhnichenko there will be some gaps to fill (Update on S. Khiznichenko, no word on where he is moving to, but apparently there has been some interest from Polish and Russian teams). The rest of the leading players seem to be staying as well as the coach, so no major disruptions as of now.

Shakhter will play Maccabi Haifa on Thursday later this week. The team is already in Israel having arrived a few days ago to train in the warm weather. Next season Kazakhstan will be represented by Aktobe in the CL and by Kairat, Astana and Shakhter in the EL. Keep an eye out for Aktobe and Kairat as they might cause a few upsets. Thanks to everybody who supported and cheered for Shakhter Karagandy, it has been a magical season for the club, its fans and all of Kazakhstan.

For the latest Shakhter news and transfer info:

 Like us on FB: http://goo.gl/szl2ig

Follow us @ShakhterKgd