On November 20, the Russian national team players completed their performance in the calendar year 2023 with a defeat of Cuba with a score of 8:0. Now they will gather no earlier than March 2024. The Russian Football Union (RFU) finally managed to give a holiday to Volgograd, which received the right to host this meeting. And in the end, the local public did not disappoint, ensuring a very high attendance for a match that was far from having the highest status.
Stadium and stars
If we sum up the main result of the fall of 2023, we can state the ability of the leadership of our football to convince any domestic football players to play for the Russian national team under the conditions of sanctions. Although, perhaps, there were no problems with this initially.
But in the fall of 2022, when we held friendly matches for the first time under the ban, the head coach of the Russian national team Valery Karpin did not call up our foreign players playing abroad. We are talking primarily about the French Monaco midfielder Alexander Golovin and the Italian Atalanta midfielder Alexei Miranchuk.
Experts and media representatives offered versions: this is a consequence of informal agreements, and our players do not go to play for Russia under pressure from their clubs. When none of them were called again in March 2023, these theories intensified.
But in the September away match with Qatar (1:1), Golovin performed. And in the October meeting with Cameroon (1:0) Miranchuk and midfielder Daler Kuzyaev, who left for the French Le Havre last summer, took part. After this it became clear that there should be no problems.
History repeated itself in November, when Golovin and Kuzyaev played in the match with Cuba. It should be noted that the RFU and the national team’s coaching staff acted nobly towards the Volgograd public. Since the match was not played in either Moscow or St. Petersburg, there was a temptation to take a more experimental lineup in order to save the leaders and test the reserves in a game with a weak opponent.
But in the end, they brought all the strongest of those they could bring. Golovin and Kuzyaev were in the starting lineup, played the first half and during the break were replaced by Sergei Pinyaev and Nikita Krivtsov – for the latter it was his debut for the first Russian national team.
The fans were grateful for this attitude and almost filled the stadium. In total, more than 40 thousand people came to the stands of the Volgograd Arena. Even the nasty weather on the day of the match did not stop them, when it rained in the city during the day and a cold wind blew in the evening. Although, compared to Moscow, Volgograd is still relatively warm.
Boot selection
On the eve of the match, a funny incident happened to the Cuban team. It turned out that she brought only boots with low plastic spikes to Volgograd, since the island has artificial fields, and such shoes are appropriate there. On natural grass, iron spikes were needed. Therefore, the team administrator and several players began walking around Volgograd shopping centers and eventually bought new boots with their own money.
True, this did not help the Cubans in the game. The difference in class was too noticeable. And we can confidently say that Russia’s weakest opponent came to Volgograd in the year and a half that we were suspended from official matches.
However, even though we created many chances, we could not score for a long time. Either the last shot was inaccurate, or visiting goalkeeper Raiko Arozarena worked wonders to save his team. Only in the 22nd minute did Ivan Oblyakov open the scoring with a pass from Golovin.
Things got easier from there. Eight minutes later they switched places: Oblyakov passed, and Golovin scored. And four minutes later the Cuban goalkeeper swam, after whose mistake Anton Miranchuk brought the matter to defeat. Afterwards, Alexander Silyanov, Alexander Sobolev, Danil Prutsev and Krivtsov scored another goal each. Not only did the guests create nothing at Matvey Safonov’s goal. It’s hard to even remember any dangerous approaches to someone else’s penalty area.
In the second half, our players completely relaxed with the comfortable score and even had fun, running up to the nearby stands to take selfies with the fans. At the same time, at the very end, Russia still didn’t score a penalty: Ismel Morgado, who came on as a substitute instead of Arozarena, saved Pinyaev’s shot.
Russia, as expected, easily dealt with Cuba and ended 2023 with dignity. And Volgograd received a real celebration – it was the most high-profile game in the local arena since the 2018 World Cup.
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