2013–14 Russian Premier League

The 2013–14 Russian Premier League was the 22nd season of the Russian football championship since the dissolution of the Soviet Union and 12th under the current Russian Premier League name. The season started on 13 July 2013 and concluded on 17 May 2014, with a winter break between the weekends around 6 December 2013 and 6 March 2014.

CSKA Moscow were the defending champions.

Teams
After previous season Mordovia Saransk and Alania Vladikavkaz were relegated to National Football League. They were replaced with Ural, FNL champions, and Tom Tomsk, FNL runners-up. Tom Tomsk returned to Premier League at first attempt, while Ural was absent from the top level for 16 seasons.

Managerial changes
Last updated: 5 May 2014

Basic
The 16 teams played a round-robin tournament whereby each team played each one of the other teams twice, once at home and once away. Thus, a total of 240 matches were played, with 30 matches played by each team.

Promotion and relegation
The teams that finished 15th and 16th were relegated to the FNL, while the top two FNL teams were promoted to the Premier League for the 2014–15 season.

The 13th and 14th Premier League teams played the 4th and 3rd FNL teams, respectively, in two playoff games, with the winner securing a Premier League spot for 2014–15 season.

Season events
On 11 May 2014, the match between Zenit and Dynamo was interrupted in the 86th minute, with Dynamo leading 4–2, when Zenit fans ran out of the stands. At first they stood behind the goal line; when the referee decided to take the teams off the field into the dressing rooms and teams began to leave, one of Zenit's fans punched Dynamo player Vladimir Granat. It was originally reported that Zenit player Salomón Rondón was also attacked. Later, it was clarified that Rondón had a conflict with Dynamo player Marko Lomić, but that incident was not registered by the referee or the game inspector. The game was abandoned. Granat was diagnosed with concussion and missed Dynamo's last game of the season against Spartak Moscow. The punishment was decided on 14 May 2014 by the Control-Disciplinary Committee of the Russian Football Union. Dynamo was awarded a 3–0 win, and Zenit was fined 700,000 rubles; they were required to play their next two home games (in the 2014–15 season) in an empty stadium, and for an additional three home games the fan stands were empty. The Zenit fan who punched Granat, 45-year-old Aleksei Nesterov known as Gulliver, was not immediately arrested, and went into hiding for several days. Eventually, he gave himself up to the police and was charged with assault. The criminal charges against Nesterov were dropped in court after he reached a settlement with Granat, and he was then released.

Second leg
Ufa won 6–4 on aggregate score and was promoted to the 2014–15 Russian Premier League.

Torpedo Moscow won 2–0 on aggregate score and was promoted to the 2014–15 Russian Premier League.

Round by round
The following table represents the teams position after each round in the competition.

Hat-tricks
Last updated: 15 May 2014

Top 33
On 7 June 2014 Russian Football Union named its list of 33 top players:


 * Goalkeepers
 * 1) 🇷🇺 Igor Akinfeev (CSKA)
 * 2) 🇷🇺 Yuri Lodigin (Zenit)
 * 3) 🇷🇺 Aleksandr Belenov (Kuban)


 * Right backs
 * 1) 🇧🇷 Mário Fernandes (CSKA)
 * 2) 🇷🇺 Roman Shishkin (Lokomotiv)
 * 3) 🇷🇺 Aleksei Kozlov (Kuban/Dynamo)


 * Right-centre backs
 * 1) 🇷🇺 Vasili Berezutskiy (CSKA)
 * 2) 🇭🇷 Vedran Ćorluka (Lokomotiv)
 * 3) 🇷🇺 Vitali Dyakov (Rostov)


 * Left-centre backs
 * 1) 🇷🇺 Sergei Ignashevich (CSKA)
 * 2) 🇸🇰 Ján Ďurica (Lokomotiv)
 * 3) 🇷🇺 Vladimir Granat (Dynamo)


 * Left backs
 * 1) 🇺🇿 Vitaliy Denisov (Lokomotiv)
 * 2) 🇷🇺 Dmitri Kombarov (Spartak)
 * 3) 🇷🇺 Georgi Shchennikov (CSKA)


 * Defensive midfielders
 * 1) 🇸🇪 Rasmus Elm (CSKA)
 * 2) 🇧🇫 Charles Kaboré (Kuban)
 * 3) 🇷🇺 Denis Glushakov (Spartak)


 * Right wingers
 * 1) 🇧🇷 Hulk (Zenit)
 * 2) 🇷🇺 Aleksandr Samedov (Lokomotiv)
 * 3) 🇷🇸 Zoran Tošić (CSKA)


 * Central midfielders
 * 1) 🇷🇺 Roman Shirokov (Zenit/Krasnodar)
 * 2) 🇧🇬 Ivelin Popov (Kuban)
 * 3) 🇷🇺 Alan Dzagoev (CSKA)


 * Left wingers
 * 1) 🇵🇹 Danny (Zenit)
 * 2) 🇧🇷 Joãozinho (Krasnodar)
 * 3) 🇷🇺 Yuri Zhirkov (Anzhi/Dynamo)


 * Right forwards
 * 1) 🇨🇮 Seydou Doumbia (CSKA)
 * 2) 🇷🇺 Artyom Dzyuba (Rostov)
 * 3) 🇦🇲 Yura Movsisyan (Spartak)


 * Left forwards
 * 1) 🇷🇺 Aleksandr Kokorin (Dynamo)
 * 2) 🇸🇳 Dame N'Doye (Lokomotiv)
 * 3) 🇧🇷 Wánderson (Krasnodar)

On the same day, the RFU also announced the individual awards.

Player of the year: 🇨🇮 Seydou Doumbia (CSKA).

"Hope of the year" (under-21 players): 🇷🇺 Aleksei Miranchuk (Lokomotiv).

Manager of the year: Leonid Slutsky (CSKA).

Referee of the year: Aleksei Nikolaev.

Team of the year: PFC CSKA Moscow.

For the contribution to the development of football: Sergey Galitsky (owner of FC Krasnodar).