Gomel ended a barren run with a comprehensive 6-0 victory over Naftan in the Premier League's Regular Season round 18 on 15 August 2026. The hosts had lost twice in a row before this, including a 0-1 defeat to Minsk, so the result carried weight beyond the three points. And here's the thing — it wasn't just a win, it was a statement.
Laptev opened the scoring in the fifteenth minute, then Lazarev doubled the advantage three minutes later. By then, Gomel were already in control. The visitors' Lebedev picked up a yellow card in the twenty-eighth minute, and Leonovich added a third before the break. Laptev converted a penalty in the forty-second minute to make it 4-0, and the first half ended with Gomel firmly in charge.
Simanenka made it 5-0 in the sixty-seventh minute, and Kovalevich rounded off the scoring in the eighty-fifth. The match was never in doubt after the opening exchanges, but what struck me was how Naftan's defence simply folded — they had no answers to the movement and repetition of attacks. To be fair, Gomel had been building something, even if the results hadn't shown it yet.
Gomel now sit fourth with 36 points from 21 matches, while Naftan remain rooted to sixteenth place with just 10 points. The gap between them is now 26 points, and that kind of distance rarely closes in a single season. Gomel's recent form looked fragile, but this performance suggests they've hit their stride at the right time.