MOSCOW, June 2. /TASS/. The coaching staff of the Russian national football team, led by Head Coach Stanislav Cherchesov, announced on Wednesday the squad’s final roster for the 2020 UEFA Euro Cup matches, which kick off this month.

Twenty-six players on the national team’s final roster were named live on the air of the Russian television channel Match-TV.

Four players from the previously announced extended roster did not join the list, namely Dynamo Moscow FC defender Roman Yevgenyev, Kazan Rubin FC defender Ilya Samoshnikov, Zenit St. Petersburg FC goalkeeper Andrei Lunev and Dynamo Moscow FC midfielder Arsen Zakharyan, who earlier left the team’s training camp in Austria after he had been diagnosed with tonsillitis.

• On the final roster of the Russian national football team for the 2020 UEFA Euro Cup are goalkeepers, Anton Shunin (Dynamo FC); Matvei Safonov (Krasnodar FC) and Yury Dyupin (Rubin FC).
• For its defenders, the team has picked Georgy Dzhikiya (Spartak FC); Igor Diveyev, Mario Fernandes (both from Lokomotiv FC); Yury Zhirkov, Vyacheslav Karavayev (both Zenit FC); Fydor Kudryashov (Turkey’s Antalyaspor FC); and Andrei Semyonov (Akhmat FC).
• As for mid-fielders, they will be Dmitry Barinov, Rifat Zhemaletdinov (both from Lokomotiv FC); Alexander Golovin (AS Monaco); Daniil Fomin (Dynamo FC); Roman Zobnin (Spartak FC); Maxim Mukhin (CSKA FC); Alexei Ionov (Kranodar FC); Daler Kuzyayev, Andrei Mostovoi, Magomed Ozdoyev (all from Zenit FC); Denis Makarov (Rubin FC); Alexei Miranchuk (Italy’s Atalanta FC); and Denis Cheryshev (Spain’s Valencia FC).
• The team’s forwards will be Artyom Dzyuba (Zenit FC); Anton Zabolotny (CSKA FC); and Alexander Sobolev (Spartak FC).

Before the start of the UEFA Euro Cup, the Russian national football squad is set to play a friendly match in Moscow on June 5 against the national team of Bulgaria.

Russia is set to embark on its journey for the UEFA Euro Cup by entering group stage matches against the national teams of Belgium, Finland and Denmark.

On March 17, 2020, UEFA announced it was postponing the 2020 UEFA Euro Cup for exactly one year as a preventive measure against the ongoing global spread of the novel coronavirus.

The championship was rescheduled to be held between June 11 and July 11, 2021 and Russia’s second-largest city of St. Petersburg was picked. It was among the 12 cities initially proposed in Europe to host the European championship’s matches. St. Petersburg was granted the right to host three group stage matches and one of the quarterfinals of the 2020 UEFA Euro Cup.

However, on April 23, St. Petersburg was granted the right to host three additional matches of the UEFA Euro Cup after Ireland’s Dublin and Spain’s Bilbao pulled out of the organization of the European football championship’s games citing anti-COVID-19 measures.

A decision to hold the 2020 Euro Cup, which celebrated its 60th anniversary in 2020, in various European countries instead of in one or two hosting countries was made at the UEFA Executive Committee’s meeting in Lausanne, Switzerland, on December 6, 2012.

Following the pullout of Bilbao and Dublin from the list of the championship’s hosting cities, the rescheduled 2020 UEFA Euro Cup is now set to be staged in 11 cities, namely in London, England; Munich, Germany; Rome, Italy; Baku, Azerbaijan; St. Petersburg, Russia; Bucharest, Romania; Amsterdam, The Netherlands; Budapest, Hungary; Glasgow, Scotland; Copenhagen, Denmark; and Seville, Spain.