Football has survived in the blockade

the Football at any time is always a joy. And wherever played matches in the days of the great Patriotic war, they carried hope everyone is looking their. If we can fight on the field, then definitely we can too. Hope is a great thing. It is, as accurately confesses, and in these days, helps to survive. Made history, not just football, “death match” of the team in occupied Kiev. Now we know a lot about the game may 1943 in the ruins of Stalingrad.

football in the siege of Leningrad is written much smaller. A lot of difficulties. The hardest time. Blockade. Hundreds of thousands of deaths. A cacophony of evidence and opinions. But, perhaps, you should not rest on purely sporting side of things. It is not the main. Do not judge strictly. We must not forget and often recall. So I’ll try.

That’s really about whom we cannot say, that his cherished destiny. Father Victor Nabutov sent in 1935 by the so-called Kirov – the assassination of the Leningrad Secretary, comrade Kirov, in 1934, and was shot in 1937. Members of the family were sent into exile. Victor got out of there in 1936: helped trouble leaders football Dynamo, which looked after the young goalkeeper as a promising talent. The mother returned only in 1940. And the son has become a celebrity: he performed in 1938 in the final of the USSR Cup in football. Played for “Elektrik”: after the execution of his father had to leave the trade Union team. Received no less appreciated then orders and medals the title of master of sports. Dynamo came back in 1940. So slowly life was getting better.

But the beginning of the Great Patriotic war. As always really cluttered with myths. And therefore, in the descriptions of the siege of football based on the story of Kirill Nabutov, the son of the goalkeeper and sports commentator Victor Nabutov Sergeevich. Always good if a son, then the grandson will inherit the profession of his father and grandfather.

But the war Victor Nabutov got to the front in July 1941. Fought on Hanko Peninsula. Then transfer to the “Nevsky spot”, passing from hand to hand. After the onset of 1942, it was waiting for the Oranienbaum bridgehead. How many were killed there! Was there another place in the long battle for Leningrad, where spilled so much native blood? Agile, evasive, strong, no wonder played volleyball, and in basketball was with his 181 inches even center, he fought and beat. Never thinking that this patch will become the symbol of the Martyr’s courage.

Blockade of heavy fighting, the unknown. But found it on the front of a telegram with the order to second Nabutov C. in Leningrad.

Winter of 1942 was for the city the hardest. But Leningrad survived. And superiors of every kind, from the physical to the party, decided to make surviving in the city a kind of spring meeting or sporting event. And managed to may 31, 1942. In the program – athletes, the throwing of grainyou and without it, football. All competitions at different times and in different places. The Assembly of the people was no good.

Players of the Leningrad “Dynamo” unwound across the country. Fought at the front, worked for evacuees remaining in St. Petersburg factories, were, as adopted in the Dynamo teams in the agencies.

Victor Nabutov did not like to tell you about the siege of football. But the son of Cyril with the help of a St. Petersburg journalist and historian Alexey Dunaevsky got a lot of interesting.

the Players were collected with difficulty. Hunger, miserable rations, terrible conditions, but he came to training. But forces were not. As there was no rivals. Remembered the Leningrad metal plant (LMZ), which before the war was based on “Zenit”. LMZ secretive, calling it N-ish. In war there are players remaining in the city. Invited players from other teams. Took the guys from other sports.

Dynamo Stadium was severely damaged by shelling. Tried, issued the orders necessary to get to may 31, but fully restore order on twisted craters from shells football field was impossible. They had to play on one of the training grounds.

Not everyone was convinced that on 31 may 1942 the athletes will run, and the throwers can throw their grenades hataasiya. But in the morning everything was OK. This is evidenced by articles in Newspapers, eyewitness accounts. Probably, it was not really a holiday. Probably not all of it has been confirmed… Surely it’s dangerous to compete and accumulate crowds when the German long-range guns already sighted around the city. But it was necessary to show not only Leningrad: the city is alive. The reception of propaganda? Of course. However necessary for the country. And for Ivan Fritz.

the Dynamo and N-sky factory did not run out, and entered the field of Dynamo stadium. At the factory is still not enough players. Saw this guy doing some exercises on the sidelines. And gymnast accidentally wandered here, has agreed to play. Didn’t have LMZ goalkeeper. Do not give them the primary and all the team loved Victor Nabutov. And stood at the gate already well known to the fans tiny defender height 163 cm Ivan Kurenkov. After the war, even as they began to play – Nabutov Dynamo, back in the “Zenith”, with whom the team captain 32-year-old Kurenkov won in 1944, the first post-war USSR Cup. And retired from football.

Before the game, the players of “Dynamo” Arkady Alov brothers Valentin and Dmitry Fedorov managed to outfit their bread cards. Damn lucky. Quickly ate some rations, leaving, overcoming the temptation the rest for later. And gone concerns that after playing them, exhausted, home is not accessible.

on the field agreed with judge Peter Pavlov, how many minutes to play. The Dynamo offered�� 45, LMW – 20. According to some memoirs, agreed to play two halves of 30 minutes. More on the feet does not hold. The match result did not matter. Considered to be 6:0 in favor of Dynamo, in which two goals were scored by Alov and Boris Oreshkin. Victor Nabutov played seriously, no gifts to give was not going to, leniency was not shown.

Spectators are few. Basically we reached the stadium the wounded from a nearby hospital.

players of “Dinamo”, which played in the besieged town for a few matches, took, as they said, to the mainland. Met with the teams of other cities. The name “Dinamo” (Leningrad) sounded proud.

Victor Nabutov played until 1948. But honors is not any Institute of physical education, the Leningrad electrotechnical and electrical engineer is not needed. Nabutov became a broadcaster. There was TV, and with it Nabutovskii gambling, but what intelligent reports. Led them people, all the delights and horrors of football myself have experienced.

there have been difficulties. He left, went away, came back. Remember Victor Nabutov S. and me. Maybe not the place, but the strongest impression from a single visit Nabutov to our house – continuous Smoking. And yet no one talked about football as he is. But come, in what time – trouble. In 1973, 56 years he died. An accident.