Season 1966 was due to answer the question whether Rubin, a newcomer of Class A, was able to gain a foothold and to survive a competition with more experienced clubs. Club coaches counted on the footballers succeeded in the previous year. Only three players were added – a goalkeeper Ilyas Galimov returned from Leningrad, and forwards Murad Zadikahvili from Kutaisi and Nikolay Vorobyov from Yoshkar-Ola came. First three games were played away. After a zero draw in Batumi and a loss from "Kuban" in Krasnodar the kazanners gained revenge from "Spartak" in Nalchik for the loss in the final of 1965. 2–1 – that was the first win in Class A. The first goal was scored by Alexey Beryuchevsky.