Pavel Viktorovich Pogrebnyak (; born 8 November 1983 in Moscow) is an association footballer currently plays as a
striker with German side
VfB Stuttgart and the
Russian national team. He is nicknamed
Pogreb ("The Cellar") or
Velikiy Po ("Po the Great"), the latter was popularized by his former Zenit teammate
Andrei Arshavin.
Club career
Pavel started playing football at the age of six for the
Spartak Moscow football school. In 2001, he made his début for the Spartak reserve team and one year later he was selected for the first team squad. Between 2001 and 2003, he scored eight goals in 23 appearances.
In 2003, Pavel played 40 matches and scored 15 goals while on loan with
Baltika Kaliningrad. The following season, he returned to Spartak Moscow, appearing 16 times and scoring two goals. The same season he also scored six goals for
FC Khimki in 12 appearances. In 2005, Pavel played for
Shinnik Yaroslavl and scored four goals in 23 matches. Pogrebnyak made his true breakthrough during the
2006 season with
Tom Tomsk scoring 13 goals in 26 matches and became one of the favorites amongst the local fans.
Zenit St. Petersburg
Pavel was signed in the off-season by
Zenit St. Petersburg. In 2007, Zenit won the
national league, with him chipping in 13 goals. Zenit won the
2008 Russian Super Cup 2–1 over
Lokomotiv Moscow, with Pogrebnyak scoring the winner in the 82nd minute.
Along with
Luca......
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