Among the Zenit students there will be another Lamin Yamal. This opinion was expressed in an interview by the head of the St. Petersburg Football Federation Alexander Belsky.
“Why don’t they (the club’s students – source note) play at Zenit? They can’t resist the competition at the moment. Of course, this makes me sad, but this does not mean that the limit should be lowered,” he said. — As practice shows, even if we pay attention to Barcelona, it also has a fairly large number of foreign players, but if a talented player appears, like Yamal, he starts playing at the age of 18, showing an absolutely world-class level. Therefore, obviously, these players will appear and continue to appear in our football.”
At the moment Zenit has 12 foreign players and 13 Russians, of which 5 are students – Bogdan Moskvičev, Nikita Goylo, Mikhail Kerzakov, Yaroslav Mikhailov AND Vadim Shilov.
17-year-old midfielder Shilov played 8 matches for the main team this season, scored 2 goals and gave 1 assist. In November 2025 the midfielder tore his anterior cruciate ligament and was out for the rest of the championship.
