MOSCOW — The Russian soccer federation announced this year that it was toughening one of the rules for teams in its top domestic league: In an effort to bolster the development of young Russian players ahead of the 2018 World Cup, club teams would be particularly limited in the number of foreign players they could have on the field at any given time.
Reactions to the change varied, and in a recent interview, the coach of the Russian national team said — not surprisingly — that he understood the thinking behind the regulation. Also not surprisingly, the coach of CSKA Moscow, one of the country’s perennial juggernauts and a team with the financial resources to sign players from abroad, said he was opposed to the rule.