Dutch coach Guus Hiddink made a winning start in his new post as coach of bigspending Russian Premier League club Anzhi Makhachkala with a 1-0 win away at Dynamo Moscow on Monday in their first match after the winter break.
Anzhi's Brazilian midfielder Jucilei da Silva scored the only goal of the match but it failed to affect their league position as they remain seventh in the table with 55 points from 33 matches, 11 points behind leaders Zenit St Petersburg.
Dynamo are third on 58 points.
"First of all I'm happy to come back to Russia and to start with a win here," Hiddink said. "I think we deserved that win as we created several good scoring chances in the first-half.
"I'm happy we managed to clinch all three points in such a hard match as the hosts Dynamo were playing very aggressively tonight."
Dynamo were in control from the start pinning Anzhi back but failed to score an early goal.
Anzhi relied on counter-attacks and in the 18th minute star striker Samuel Eto'o missed a great chance to break the deadlock after a mix-up in the Dynamo defence as his shot from 12 metres out could only hit the woodwork.
After the break both sides failed to conjure up many scoring opportunities until the 69th minute, when Jucilei opened the scoring firing home a rebound after a freekick by Mbark Boussoufa.
Source: AFP
