Sand giants

The Russian team became the world champion in beach football. The third time in its history

... Many people treat this sport (three halims of 12 minutes) with a smile. As, in fact, to beach volleyball, beach rugby and handball in the sand. Like, the guys and girls are resting: they have fun by the reservoir, sunbathe, drink mochito and throw the ball to peppy music and screams of gulls. Once everything really began at the ocean. In the country of wild monkeys, on the sunny 4-kilometer capacaban, where dark-skinned, white-toothed young men, who did not part with a round shell from childhood, did not virtually allow themselves to get bored and their friends, arranging noisy battles of local significance.

Once I also had a chance to confuse with real Brazilians on a loose floor. True, in Turkey. In 1994. I say this is not to boast. It’s just one of the natives of Rio de Janeiro, who played the present for local clubs in Socker, then said: “I hope that someday people will buy tickets for such hot battles ...” And he was not mistaken. A year later, informal congresses of the best barefoot geniuses from all over the planet began to be held, on which such aces of big football as ZICO and Junior shone. And in 2005, FIFA took a new discipline under her powerful wing. And everything became officially and quite solemn. It is noteworthy that in the first champions of the world, not South American figures turned, but the French with a technical and terrible Eric Canton. The ancestors, of course, will take their own then ...

But it is much more curious that the beach round dance, in which, according to statistics, the ball flies into the gate every three minutes, and the goalkeeper juggles and attacks, wrapped it in absolutely not football Russia. Not without the help of Vitaly Mutko, who in an interview said that he himself tamed a leather ball in the sand back in the army. However, when the people who decided to knead the bones on the sandy quarries of Valery Karpin, Alexander Mostovoy, Sergey Kiryakov, Alexei Simnin, Ruslan Nigmatullin and other stars of the Russian Nogoyach did not go out golden wing, it seemed that the game 5x5 in the vast expanses of our already cold country would not take root. However, everything turned out exactly the opposite.

So far, our “big” players tried from year to year (and they are trying now) at least just get to the uniform,

In no one famous guys who gradually mastered the Brazilian wisdom and composing over time their tactics and strategy on the platform of 27 by 38 meters, famously broke into the beach elite.

And in 15 years they replenished the sports museum with the following trophies: two European Cups, three intercontinental cups, five “cups” for victory in the Euroleague. And in 2011 and 2013, the Russian team won the World Cup, laying rivals on the shoulder blades in all 12 matches. And this despite the fact that the residents of that golden squad were forced to work in parallel not by the profile in order to earn an urgent bread. For example, the goalkeeper Bukhlitsky traded in sports equipment, the defender Gorchinsky taxed, many were instructed in fitness centers, someone collected kitchen furniture ...

And it is unlikely that even the permanent coach of the national national team Mikhail Likhachev suggested that the arena for the world football and sand fair would someday be collected in Luzhniki. And even if the Covid-19 to the Angels did not contribute, the miniature holiday was a success. Those who visited a cozy square 5,000 stadium for 10 days recalled colorful events of three years ago. Again fans from Brazil, Portugal, Spain, Uruguay and other 11 countries, who came to Moscow, were happy to share photos of an unforgettable trip-2018. And again there were incendiary songs and dances. And again, in the park near the arena, port and Kashas were together together. And again, the compatriots of Vasco da Gama and Jose Artigasa, who were flying from the golden race, were crying into hats. And again the bad Brazilians sobbed, who lost to the 1/4 finals to a powerful senegal.

... Russia, although it was traditionally considered one of the favorites, but Mikhail Likhachev modestly remarked that getting into the three would be luck. The phenomenal brigade began the group tournament not at all in a businesslike way: only in extra time did the Americans cherished, and the Paraguayers were defeated only in the penalty shootout. But then the Japanese grabbed seven goals, and in the quarterfinals the red sand car confidently crushed the Spaniards (4: 2). But the semifinals against Switzerland due to the enforcement of cards were forced to skip three key football players: Zemsk, Paporotny and Makarov. And 2 minutes before the end, the Great Acts Stankovich Sorotovych led two goals. Finita la comedy? No! Miracles also happen in the "beach": the Banda weakened by disqualifications translated the match into overtime (5: 5). And on the eleven -meter lottery, our wise coach released the third goalkeeper, who had not sniffed sand at the tournament before. And the fresh Denis Parkhomenko retorted one of the five penalties, and his partners beat without a miss.

... The Sunday ending with the representatives of the Land of the Rising Sun, who created several sensations along the championship, turned out to be stubborn and nervous.

The Japanese, whom the Russians never inferior, bent, but did not give up. They worthily answered the blow through themselves Zemskov. They were not embarrassed by two beautiful penalties performed by “our guys”.

And only after the Paporotny sewed the goalkeeper an orphan and made a score of 4: 2, the island guys in white T -shirts exhaled sadly. In the third half, the fans pulled the song by MakSim “Do you know”, under which bare Russian masters, not sparing their legs, companionally squeezed the enemy. The author of the fifth, final ball, 36-year-old Yuri Krashennikov, who, together with Anton Kaparin and Dmitry Shishin, won the President of FIFA Gianni Infantino, who had already rewarded three-time world champions in the world, applauded in 2011 and 2013 ...

“I'm so tired. I am grateful to all my guys. We are madly happy. Thanks to the wonderful spectators, ”the most intelligent Russian coach Mikhail Viktorovich Likhachev commented on the next triumph, who gave all his forces on the edge and which can be safely called legendary.