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The 2010 Russian Premier League begins on 11th March, with most first round matches on the weekend of 13-14 March. Click on the following for fixtures, etc., Russian premier League 2010 season, fixtures and table (Soccerway.com).
Reigning champions are now-twice-straight winners Rubin Kazan of the Republic of Tatarstan. Cynics in Russia are starting to admit this squad is for real, and maybe now the Russia national team will stop snubbing their players. As Victor Gusev pointed out in the World Soccer , January 2010 issue, all through the failed 2010 World Cup qualifications, the only Rubin Kazan player who featured at all in the Russia team was Rubin captain and playmaker Sergei Semak. Notably ignored by the hierarchy and by Russia coach Guus Hiddink was rising star forward Aleksandr Bukharov, who only made his debut in October. Bukharov is Tatarstan-born.
Here is an article by Jonathon Wilson at the Guardian.co.uk, from 24 November, 2009, ‘Rubin Kazan have good reason to thank the blinkered Guus Hiddink- The Dutchman’s ignoring of Rubin players may have helped them retain the title and cost Russia a World Cup finals place,’ {click here} .
Other Russian-born Rubin standouts are winger Aleksandr Ryazantsev and goalkeeper Sergei Ryzhikov (Ryazantsev scored the first goal in the 2nd minute at Nou Camp in October, 2009, when Rubin Kazan shocked reigning European champions FC Barcelona 2-1 in the Champions League).

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The off-season was turbulent in Russia, with one club, FC Moscow, dropping out of the league, and one club, Krylia Sovetov Samara, being saved at the eleventh hour by government intervention (spurred by none other than former President and current power-behind-the-throne Vladimir Putin). See this, from the Russian Football Now site (17th February, 2010): ‘Krylia saved after Putin demands support’, by Andrew Skomra, on 17th February, 2010.
Krylia were saved from being wound up because the club draws very well (by Russian standards), and their demise would have left a gaping hole in the Russian Premier League. There is a recent precedent, though, in that Tom Tomsk recieved similar central government support last year.
FC Moscow’s top flight departure is not so tragic, seeing as how they drew poorly and were always overshadowed by the four big clubs from Russia’s biggest city…those four clubs being Spartak Moscow, CSKA Moscow, Dinamo Moscow, and Lokomotiv Moscow.

FC Moscow will probably end up playing in the third level, which is the regional, 5-branch Russian Second Division . The club’s owners, MMC Norilsk Nickel, of Norilsk, northern Siberia, saw no point in continuing to waste money on a football club thousands of miles away from their home base. So that meant that former Russian champions Alania Vladikavkaz were benficiaries. and suddenly found themselves promoted. Alania Vladikavkaz are from Vladikavkaz (population 312,000 {2004}, North Ossetia, in the Caucases Mountains in the far south of Russia.

When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, Spartak Vladikavkaz were the only non-Muscovite team in the Soviet Top League. And in 1995, as Spartak-Alaniya Vladikavkaz, the club ended up being the sole Russian champions from outside Moscow for the first 15 post-Soviet seasons in Russia [The Soviet Top League was replaced in 1992 by the Russian Top League (1992-1997)/Russian Top Division (1998-2000)/Russian Premier League (2001-present)].
FK Spartak-Alaniya Vladikakaz averaged 33,467 per game in their championship-winning season in 1995. Their attendance stayed in the 26,000-27,000 range for three more seasons after they won the crown, and through to the early 2000’s, Alania had solid gate figures between 16,000 and 20,000.
So Spartak-Alaniya-Vladikavkaz, this club from the small capital of North Ossetia, was drawing better than most every other club in Russia (with the exception of Krylia Sovetov Samara by 2001 and Zenit St. Petersburg by 2003). But despite their good gate figures, Alania were constantly beset by financial problems and began to finally succumb, and a decade after their sole championship, Alania Vladikavkaz were relegated in 2005.

Four years later, as third place finishers in the Russian First Division in 2009, Alania Vladikavkaz find themselves being in the right place at the right time and thus takes FC Moscow’s place in the Russian Premier League for 2010. Alania are currently scrambling to find suitable roster upgrades.

The other two promoted clubs for 2010 are Anzhi Makhachkala, from the Republic of Dagestan, which is on the Caspian Sea and bordered by Azerbaijan; and Sibir Novosibirsk, of Novosibirsk, Siberian Federal District. This season will be the fourth season Anzhi plays in the Russian top flight, and it will be the top tier debut of Sibir Novosibirsk.

The promotions of Alania Vladikakavkaz and Anzhi Makhachkala means there are now 4 RPL clubs all within a 150-km radius (90-mile radius) in southern Russia. The other two clubs nearby are Terek Grozny, from the once embattled and now recovering Republic of Chechnya; and Professional Football Club Spartak Nalchik, who are from the gorge-and-mountain lake-strewn Republic of Kabardino-Balkaria, which has the highest point in Europe at Mount Elbrus.

And, well, I don’t know if it can be called a derby, but the distance between the city of Tomsk, in the Siberian Federal District, and the city of Novosibirsk is only 207 kilometers/119 miles. In the vastness of Siberia, that makes Sibir Novosibirsk and Tom Tomsk like next-door neighbors.

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Here is a good thread from the Skyscraperciy.com site. It is titled ‘Football Average Attendances’, but this page of the thread became subtitled “football atmosphere in Russia”, submitted by Outcaster on 23 March, 2009… photos-football atmosphere in Russia. The thread goes down the list of teams and their stadiums, starting with two nice shots of Rubin Kazan’s Tsentralnyi Stadium, where you can see the pale blue domes and minarets of Kazan in the skyline.

Thanks to the contributors to the pages at en.wikipedia.org, Russian premier League Page at en.wikipedia.org.
Thanks to Russian Premier League official site, www.rfpl.org/ [note: I couldn't get an English translation for this, but it's still easy enough to navigate and you can see kits of each club on each club's site (ie, click on football club logos to get there)].
Thanks to E-F-S site, for attendance figures, european-football-statistics.co.uk.
Thanks to photographersdirect.com .
Thanks to Football Fashion.org, Rubin Kazan Umbro 2010 Home Jersey.
Thanks to Richard Farley, who is found at a number of places including Russian Football Now , and at EPL Talk.com (ie, EPL Talk Podcast, Tim Vickery Interview ).