Sergey Ignashevich almost opened the scoring from a dangerous free kick on the 30th minute, but goalkeeper Samir Handanovic deflected the ball, postponing Slovenian blushes for ten minutes.

With five minutes left in the first half, Everton’s Dinyar Bilyaletdinov got a pass from Tottenham’s Roman Pavlyuchenko near the penalty spot, jinxed past two center backs and put the ball in the top right corner of Handanovic’s goal.

The frantic pace of Russian attacks started becoming more and more evident with every second of the second half, with Arsenal’s Andrey Arshavin missing a header in very first minute after the break.

Ignashevich had another free kick saved by Handanovich, but once again this was minutes before another goal for Russia.

For his second take Bilyaletdinov converted a cross by Arshavin. His initial shot bounced back from a defender, but he was there to take advantage of the rebound, burying it into the left corner of the goal.

Hiddink upped the tempo even further by putting on Zenit’s Vladimir Bystrov for Sergey Semak.

And on the 66th, Pavluchenko missed another two golden chances, courtesy of Handanovich’s good reactions.

He was later substituted, paving the way for Lokomotiv Moscow’s Dmitry Sychev who marked his comeback to the national team with a yellow card in just minutes.

The home side continued to attack and Bilyaletdinov almost completed a hat-trick, as his header from a Bystrov cross narrowly missed the top corner.

But two minutes before the final whistle an underestimated Slovenia caught the Russians unawares, when West Brom’s Robert Koren had his cross deflected by goalkeeper Igor Akinfeev and Nejc Pecnik outjumped Yury Zhirkov, who was marking him, at the left post.

The goal spawned an array of Slovenian attacks and the home side was close to conceding another in extra time, but luck was not on their side tonight.

Russia will now head to Maribor on Wednesday, November 18, after this shaky 2-1 win at home.