The Great Bear has emerged from its winter stasis and with it the RPL returns this weekend!

Footy Matters brings you bang up to date with the lie of the land and a prediction of our own.

There are those who will tell you that to suffer is to be Russian. Some might even say that suffering is at the heart of the Russian soul. At the very least, the Russian football fan is accustomed to it.

So while we, in the realm of Richard Keys, nervously eye wall-calendars and glance forlornly at blank, silent, phone updates during the few summer weeks when shopping or socialising interrupts the footy fixtures, our Russian cousins must endure three months of close-season celibacy. What’s more, they do it across the absolute depths of the Russian winter.

And how cruel the winter can be – Guus Hiddink, for instance, quit the national team for Turkey after failing to take Russia to this summer’s World Cup. But for FC Moscow fans the winter was crueller still and they’ve emerged from hibernation to find their club has disappeared after owners, metal giants Norilsk Nickel, decided not to fund them any more. As a result, FC Moscow have fallen out of the RPL and into immediate liquidation.

But winter, of course, turns to spring soon enough and so fans of Alania Vladikhavkaz, who finished third in the Russian First Division last year behind fellow new-boys Anzhi Makhachkala and Sibir Novosibirsk, find themselves back amid the top flight for the first time in four years as they replace (amid murmurs of a political, pro-Caucasus conspiracy) the unfortunate Citizens.

Alania and Anzhi (the “Dagestani Men”) now add to the coterie of Southern Russian sides in the RPL and Sibir joins Tom Tomsk as the division’s least favourite away end (in deepest Siberia). But what kind of landscape will the followers of these new-comers encounter? Well, let’s remind ourselves of how things were left as the winter closed in…

2009 ROUND UP AND A LOOK FORWARDS

RUBIN KAZAN

Crowned champions for a second season in succession, becoming the first ever non-Moscow based club to win back-to-back titles and driving another nail into the coffin of Moscow’s cartel – one that has hoarded each RPL title, save three, since the league’s conception in 1992. Losing the mercurial Argentine, Alejandro Dominguez on a free to Valencia will hurt the Ruby but they are still under the control of the masterly Kurban Berdyev.

FM Prediction: First – Berdyev’s ability to instil calmness and confidence has been the key to success thus far, a rare thing in Russian football.

SPARTAK MOSCOW

The once mighty Meat finished eight points behind Rubin but will hope that Valery Karpin’s precociously talented young side that lacked just a little nous and experience last time around will be more consistent this year.

FM Prediction: Third – Their young side has the potential to dominate Russian football but not for a year or two yet.

ZENIT ST PETERSBURG

Charged into third spot with a great finish to 2009 and will pray they can add to Moscow’s leanest ever spell by taking the crown home to St Petersburg. Again, heavy spending is evidence of their ambition, with Serb Danko Lazovic (£4.5m from PSV) and Russian international Alexander Kerzhakov (£4.8m from Dynamo Moscow) added to their attack.

FM Prediction: Fourth – The decision to install Luciano Spalletti as manager smacks of a desire to chase a fancy name (a la Manhester City and Mancini) to ‘fit the brand’, rather than expediently build on the good work of club legend Anatoly Davydov.

LOKOMOTIV MOSCOW

Fourth-placed in 2009, Lokomotiv still look to be the weakest of last season’s top five despite splashing the cash on Ukraine midfielder Oleksandr Aliyev (£7.1m from Dynamo Kiev).

FM Prediction: Fifth – for Loko more than any other, spending big does not equal success.

CSKA MOSCOW

Last term saw the Army Men finish a lowly fifth, unsettled by the collateral damage of three regime changes (Zico, Juande Ramos and the current Leonid Slutskiy) and, despite losing out to Rubin in last Sunday’s Super Cup, they could provide Rubin with their stiffest competition. But any serious title-challenge will depend on whether they can hang on to star players Akinfeev, Dzagoev and Krasic.

FM Prediction – Any sense of cohesion provided by Slutskiy will be eroded by the plundering that will no doubt occur when the rest of Europe’s powerhouses enter the transfer window this summer.

FOR THE DROP?

Apart from Rubin, the other success story of the 2009 season was Spartak Nalchik who, under the stewardship of Yury Krasnozhan, pulled off the escape of the year by staying up when almost universally tipped to go down. However, they will surely be in the mix again this time and it remains to be seen whether lightning will strike twice. Most likely, they’ll be battling it out at the bottom with the newbies, Anzhi Makachkala, Sibir Novosibirsk and the original non-Moscow champs (1995), Alania Vladikhavkaz.