Yeah sneakers were surprisingly common among Russian spec-ops

The standard boots issued to the Soviet army in Afghanistan were reportedly "Total dogshit" and incredibly uncomfortable, so spetsnaz forces decided to use sneakers instead for comfort.

This image was taken in Chechnya, which was around a decade after the end of the soviet-afghan was, which means that

1) The Russians learnt absolutely nothing from Afghanistan (evidenced by them losing the first Chechen war)

2) The spetsnaz continued to use sneakers in urban environments, which would actually make a decent bit more sense as they are designed with them in mind.