Premier League (Russia)

The Russian Premier League (Russia) (founded in 1992 as the Russian Top Division and operating in its current Premier League format since 2002) is the national top tier of Russian club football. Tournament regulations: in the current format 16 clubs compete in an autumn-to-spring season using a double round-robin schedule, each team plays every other club twice, home and away, for a total of 30 matches. A win is worth 3 points, a draw 1 point and a loss 0 points. If teams are level on points, positions are decided first by head-to-head results between the tied clubs (points, number of wins, goal difference and goals scored in those matches), then by total number of wins, overall goal difference and total goals scored over the season. If all of these criteria are still equal, an additional play-off match or mini-tournament is used to determine the final positions. At the end of the season the teams finishing 15th and 16th are relegated to the First League, while the clubs in 13th and 14th place play two-legged promotion and relegation play-offs against the 4th and 3rd placed teams from the First League respectively. The winners on aggregate earn a place in the Russian Premier League for the following season.