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Male athletes have a natural advantage over females, making competition between the sexes unfair and dangerous, Reem Alsalem believes

Athletes who were born male should not be allowed to compete in women’s sports because they enjoy an unfair advantage, according to the UN special rapporteur on violence against women and girls, Reem Alsalem. Her comments follow a transgender controversy at the Paris Olympics, which highlighted safety issues facing participants and called into question the integrity of the games.

Alsalem on Thursday presented a report to the organization in which she warned that female athletes could be physically vulnerable to biological males when competing in the same sports.

Emphasizing that the sports function on the premise that “a separate category for females is needed to ensure equal, fair and safe opportunities,” she noted, as cited by Sky News, that “multiple studies offer evidence that athletes born male have proven performance advantages in sport throughout their lives.”

According to Alsalem, undermining the eligibility criteria in single-sex sports would lead to “unfair, unlawful and extreme forms of discrimination against female athletes.” In light of this, she argued, sports authorities should “ensure that female categories in organized sport are exclusively accessible to persons whose biological sex is female” to guarantee fair play.

The official noted that in cases when the sex of an athlete is “unknown or uncertain,” this person should undergo genetic testing in a dignified manner, such as a cheek swab.

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Alsalem said that while the report – which she described as independent and having a certain authoritative weight – will not have any legally binding implications, she hopes it will contribute to the human rights conversation.

The report comes in the wake of a gender scandal at the Paris Olympics, where Algerian boxer Imane Khelif won the gold medal in women’s boxing. Khelif was disqualified from competition last year by the International Boxing Association (IBA) after a DNA test indicated that the athlete was ineligible to compete with women. Khelif has denied allegations of being born a biological male while complaining of “online harassment.”

Commenting on the controversy, International Olympic Committee President Thomas Bach said that there is not “a scientifically solid system how to identify men and women,” arguing that chromosome testing is no longer sufficient to distinguish between the two sexes. According to the IOC, the decision came down to Khelif’s passport, which identifies the athlete as a woman.

The Palestinian Football Association has called for the country to be barred from sporting events over the war in Gaza

The world football governing body, FIFA, reportedly has no intention of suspending Israeli teams from its tournaments over the war in Gaza.

The Palestinian Football Association (PFA) submitted a proposal to suspend Israel in May, citing the armed conflict, raging since last October. FIFA has postponed its decision on the matter twice, most recently in late August, when the organization said its Zurich-based executive council would make an assessment in early October.

The Israeli sports website ONE claimed on Monday that no sanctions would be imposed on the Israel Football Association (IFA) or the national team. The article did not specify the source of the insider information.

The outlet said Israel was lucky that the request was handled by the 37-strong FIFA Council – and that if it were taken up by the FIFA Congress, the supreme legislative body of the association, which includes more than 200 members and gathers annually, “we would have no chance against the global majority, which is currently against Israel.”

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Supporters of the Palestinian proposal have argued that the Israeli military campaign in Gaza violates FIFA’s stated goals, and warrants punishment by the organization. The death toll in the conflict, which was triggered by a deadly incursion into Israel by the militant group Hamas on October 7 last year, has surpassed 41,000 and may be significantly higher, according to aid groups and observers.

Commenting on the ONE report on Tuesday, Russian lawmaker Dmitry Svishchev said that if true, it simply highlights that international sports follow double standards, as Moscow knows from its own experience.

“Russia, it appears, has no rights. Any action by our nation is treated as forbidden, leading to disqualification of athletes. If Israel plays in FIFA international tournaments, why can’t Russians be allowed?” he said in comments to the sports channel Match TV.

READ MORE: ‘EU capital’ refuses to host Belgium-Israel football match

FIFA suspended Russian teams from participating in its tournaments in February 2022, responding to the outbreak of the Ukraine conflict.

Benjamin Garre has signed a contract with Russia’s Krylia Sovetov for three and a half years

Argentinian professional soccer player Benjamin Garre has declared his intention to apply for Russian citizenship just months after signing a contract with the Krylia Sovetov club based in the Russian city of Samara.

The 22-year-old left winger first told the club’s director, Sergey Kornilenko, about his plans, the Match TV sports channel reported this week. In an interview with Match, Garre confirmed his intention. “I might spend many years in this country. I’ve only been here a month, but I’m already feeling great!” he said.

“I want to get a [Russian] passport, and I am ready to spend many years in Russia,” he added. Last week, his agent, Emilio Champion, told Match TV that he was helping the player get all the necessary documents for Russian citizenship.

“We are still gathering all the necessary papers… That will take some time to fulfill all the [Russian] government requirements,” Champion said. Earlier, Champion also explained that Garre was likely to give up his Argentinian citizenship to get the Russian passport.

Garre is the grandson of the 1986 FIFA World Cup winner, Oscar Garre, and has represented Argentina at junior level, winning bronze at the 2015 U15 South American Championship.

READ MORE: Action movie icon says he’s ‘million percent’ Russian

In 2018, the player signed with the English club Manchester City. In 2020, he returned to Argentina and joined Racing Club de Avellaneda before moving to Club Atletico Huracan on loan. In January, Garre moved to Krylia Sovetov Samara on a €1.75 million ($1.92 million) transfer.

Magnus Carlsen won’t defend his title, leaving China’s Ding Liren to face Russia’s Ian Nepomniachtchi in Astana for chess’ top honor

Russia and China have been making headlines of late for their deepening bilateral ties, but for three weeks in April, two men from these respective countries will be locked in a fierce battle for the ultimate prize in professional chess – the title of world champion. 

Admittedly, a bit of the air was taken out of this year’s event when five-time reigning world champion Magnus Carlsen of Norway declined to defend his title – a crown he maintained with a convincing victory over the same Nepomniachtchi in Dubai two years ago. 

RT previews what is in store for this year’s duel and takes a peek into the rarified world of top-level chess. 

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The what, when, and where of the championship match

The next world champion of chess will be crowned at the conclusion of a 14-game match with classical time controls to be held over three weeks at the St. Regis Astana Hotel in Astana, Kazakhstan. The opening ceremony will be on April 7, with the first game slated for April 9. 

If the players are tied after the 14 classical games, the champion will be decided in a series of tiebreaks with shorter time controls. Such an outcome would by no means be unprecedented: the 2018 World Championship match between Carlsen and American challenger Fabiano Caruana was decided by tiebreaks after all 12 classical games ended in draws. 

Vying for the title will be 32-year-old Ian Nepomniachtchi from Russia, who will be competing under the flag of the world chess federation (FIDE), and 30-year-old Ding Liren from China. 

Nepomniachtchi is making his second consecutive appearance in the championship match, having taken on Magnus Carlsen in Dubai in 2021. He qualified for this year’s event by winning the Candidates Tournament, a grueling double round-robin tournament featuring eight of the top players in the world. 

Ding finished second to Nepomniachtchi in the Candidates Tournament but qualified to take on the Russian in Astana when Carlsen announced that he would not be defending his title. 

Nepomniachtchi and Ding are ranked number two and three in the world FIDE rankings, respectively. The head-to-head record is three wins for Nepomniachtchi, two for Ding and eight draws. 

The time control for the 14 classical games will be 120 minutes per side for the first 40 moves, 60 minutes for the next 20 moves and 15 minutes for the rest of the game, with 30 seconds added for each move starting on move 61. 

The hefty €2 million prize fund for the match will be split 60% and 40% between the winner and runner-up.

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Where is Magnus?

On July 20, 2022, following the conclusion of the Candidates Tournament, Magnus Carlsen, the reigning world champion and the globe’s top-ranked player for over a decade, announced on his podcast that he would not be defending his title. 

“I am not motivated to play another match. I simply feel that I don’t have a lot to gain, I don’t particularly like it, and although I’m sure a match would be interesting for historical reasons and all of that, I don’t have any inclination to play and I will simply not play the match,” the world champion said. 

Although Carlsen’s announcement sent reverberations throughout the chess world, it wasn’t entirely unexpected. The Norwegian had previously expressed his dissatisfaction with the format of the championship and hinted that he might decline to participate. 

Nearly all chess commentators acknowledge that Carlsen’s withdrawal takes a bit of the luster away from an event that has been held 48 times in various formats since its induction in 1886 – with the world’s number one player taking part in all but a few of them. 

Carlsen first became world champion in 2013, defeating India’s Viswanathan Anand. He successfully defended his title in 2014, 2016, 2018, and 2021. 

The cast of characters

Nepomniachtchi grew up in the Russian city of Bryansk and learned to play chess at the age of four with the help of his grandfather. His prodigious talent became apparent early on and he quickly rose through the junior ranks. In 2000, he won the Under 10 European Championship and proceeded to garner several more European and world youth titles. However, Nepomniachtchi is a man with broad interests – including being a professional-level Dota 2 player – and for a long time he opted not to devote himself entirely to chess. 

As a result, for many years he was considered a very strong grandmaster but not among the absolute elite. In 2013, when the 23-year-old Carlsen won his first world championship, the 23-year old Nepomniachtchi finished the year ranked just 29th in the world.

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He had earned a reputation as being perhaps the least hardworking player among the top 20 or so. However, approaching his 30th birthday, Nepomniachtchi changed his approach, improved his work ethic, and eradicated much of the inconsistency that dogged him earlier in his career. The results soon followed and the Russian catapulted into the exclusive group of players with designs on a world title. 

Ding hails from the Chinese city of Wenzhou and has accumulated an impressive set of accolades over his career. However, his more private nature and minimal visibility in the media and online blogosphere have kept him somewhat under the radar of many chess fans. 

The Chinese grandmaster posted impressive showings at the Youth World Championships in 2003 and 2004. However, he burst onto the scene in earnest in 2009 by going undefeated to win the Chinese Chess Championship at the age of 16, defeating two strong grandmasters, Wang Hao and Ni Hua, in the process. The tournament was also where Ding secured his final grandmaster norm, thus earning the sport’s most prestigious title short of world champion.  

Ding’s rise thereafter was steady if not meteoric. In 2015, he broke into the world top ten, becoming only the second Chinese player to accomplish that feat. In 2017-18, he put together a run of 100 straight games without a loss, a record streak at top-level chess at the time (Carlsen would subsequently shatter it by reaching 125).

During the pandemic, however, Ding was often caught up in lockdowns in his hometown of Wenzhou and his chess suffered. He was on the verge of missing the 2022 Candidates Tournament to determine the contenders for the World Championship match because he had not played enough games to qualify. 

The rules state that a player must have played 30 rated FIDE games over the past year – and no exceptions were in store for players hailing from lockdown-ridden China. Ding had played only four with around a month to go before the deadline. In a bid to make the country’s top player eligible, the Chinese Chess Federation hastily organized several tournaments for Ding to play. He completed the punishing month-long quest with panache, notching 13 victories, 15 draws, and not a single defeat. 

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In the Candidates Tournament, Ding went on to finish in second – trailing only Nepomniachtchi. When Carlsen announced his intention not to defend his title, Ding was vaulted into the match for chess supremacy. 

The grueling sport of chess

Elite professional chess is a world apart from the leisurely ‘café and coffee’ board game played for centuries by amateurs. It is a sport that takes an enormous physical toll on those who compete at the top level. 

In fact, in explaining his decision to bow out of the 2023 title match, Carlsen also cited the stress and mental and physical toll of training for and playing a world championship match.  

In addition to the enormous amount of preparation that goes into such a match, the actual games themselves can be tremendously exhausting. 

It is by no mistake of terminology that chess is called a sport. In 2018, a US-based company tracked the heart rates of chess players during a tournament. They found that in two hours of sitting and shuffling chess pieces around the board, Russian grandmaster Mikhail Antipov had burned 560 calories – roughly what a professional tennis player would burn in an hour of a singles match. 

The 2021 match between Carlsen and Nepomniachtchi featured what turned out to be the longest game ever in the 135-year history of the World Chess Championship. Game six between the two men lasted an astonishing seven hours and forty-five minutes, and concluded after Nepomniachtchi resigned in a lost position following Carlsen’s 136th move.

Stanford University researcher Robert Sapolsky, one of whose fields of study is stress in primates, believes that “grandmasters sustain elevated blood pressure for hours in the range found in competitive marathon runners.” Some chess players lose a noticeable amount of weight during competitions, sometimes as much as 4-5 kg during a ten-day tournament. 

Russian grandmaster and former world champion Anatoly Karpov reportedly lost about 10kg over the five-month-long World Chess Championship match in 1984 against Garry Kasparov. Much as a boxing referee may halt a bloody slugfest to save the fighters from serious injury, the 1984 contest was called off after 48 games, with the head of the international chess federation saying that the match had “exhausted the physical, if not the psychological, resources of not only the participants but of all those associated with the match.”

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“He looked like death,” grandmaster and commentator Maurice Ashley recalled about Karpov’s appearance. 

The format of requiring six wins to clinch victory in the match – meaning an open-ended number of games would be needed – was abandoned after the 1984 event, which saw 40 of the 48 games end in a draw. 

Applying supercomputers to an ancient game

Ever since the Deep Blue chess computer defeated world champion Garry Kasparov in a match in 1996, computers have played an increasingly important role in chess. These days, the most powerful chess programs – called ‘engines’ – are capable of defeating even the top humans. Elite players run extensive computer analysis on chess positions and use engines to develop massive databases of opening moves and responses to parry common opening setups played by their opponents. 

Because the number of possible moves in a chess game exceeds the number of atoms estimated to exist in the universe, powerful computers are much more efficiently able to parse through the myriad of possible transformations of any given chess position. 

Computers are now an essential component in the toolkit of even amateur players, but the pros have taken it much further, employing supercomputers and sophisticated AI-powered engines. 

Nepomniachtchi has been at the forefront of taking advantage of such capabilities. Prior to the 2020-21 Candidates Tournament, Nepomniachtchi’s team reached out to the researchers at Moscow’s Skolkovo Institute of Technology in order to adapt a number of existing chess engines for an AI-based supercomputer cluster. 

The researchers agreed to help and allocated the Zhores supercomputer for his use. Zhores was designed for scientific research into machine learning and artificial intelligence but was adapted to allow Nepomniachtchi to evaluate tens of millions of chess positions per second.

After winning the 2021 Candidates Tournament, the Russian grandmaster credited the cutting-edge machine for augmenting his preparation in the opening phase of the game.  

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“It can’t harm my chances,” he said. “And this particular supercomputer, because it is a huge data center which can be used for scientific research, is hopefully more effective than others.”  

Of course, top-level chess being fiercely competitive, all the best players have access to something similar. However, having a computer that can calculate faster and potentially see deeper than others offers the possibility of developing some kind of surprise in the opening. Given the extremely small margin of error in elite games, which are played on a knife’s edge, a well-planned novelty can be employed to devastating effect. 

“You’re more sure that your analysis is good when you see 500 million node positions than, say 100 million,” Nepomniachtchi said. 

So who is expected to win? 

The majority of the chess commentators see Nepomniachtchi and Ding as fairly evenly matched. 

Financial Times chess writer Leonard Barden called Nepomniachtchi’s recent career record “slightly more convincing” and expects the Russian to win. 

Former world champion Garry Kasparov called both “very good players” and said picking between the two was “a very, very close call” before concluding that “Nepo [Nepomniachtchi’s nickname] has a slight edge though Ding is more stable than Nepo.” 

The betting odds, according to Forbes magazine, are roughly 50-50. 

From ice hockey to gymnastics, Russian athletes have created numerous signature moves down the years

Russian athletes have undoubtedly made their mark on sports worldwide – so much so that some moves in their chosen disciplines have been named in their honor because of the way they popularized or introduced them. Here, we look at five sports moves named after Russian stars.

‘The Datsyuk Flip’ – ice hockey

Known as the ‘Magic Man’ for the way he handled his stick to pull off some unfathomable moves, Pavel Datsyuk was one of the biggest names in hockey in the 2000s and enjoyed a 15-year career in the elite NHL with the Detroit Red Wings before returning to his homeland.

Datsyuk will forever be a legend in the Motor City for his contributions to Stanley Cup titles in 2002 and 2008, but his participation on this list came after heroics in 2010.

Taking the first shot of a shootout against the Red Wings’ bitter rivals the Chicago Blackhawks in a January regular season game, Datsyuk made a mockery of opposition goaltender Antti Niemi. 

Gliding up to the Finn down the middle, Datsyuk did a slight ‘dirty dangle’ that he was famous for, then quickly flicked his wrist to make it appear as if he would backhand his effort. Instead, the Russian scooped the puck with the inside of his stick into the net.

Datsyuk’s audacity understandably sent the Joe Louis Arena into rapture, as well as his teammates. “They can’t believe it on the Red Wings bench,” said one elated commentator. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen a slow-mo play like that.”

While Niemi and the Blackhawks had the last laugh that season as he became the first Finnish goalie to win the Stanley Cup, he is often remembered for being on the wrong end of Datsyuk’s trick shot.

The move became immortalized as the ‘Datsyuk Flip’, with hockey enthusiasts attempting to pull it off on the popular NHL video game to this day.

On a side note, the ‘Datsyuk deke’ wasn’t too shoddy either. Again produced in a shootout, it led one pundit to ask: “How many does he have in his repertoire?”

‘The Khorkina’ – artistic gymnastics (uneven bars)

Svetlana Khorkina burst onto the global stage with a pair of silver medals at the 1994 World Championships in Brisbane, not long after her 15th birthday. Two years later, she enjoyed gold-medal success in the uneven bars at the Atlanta Olympics, bouncing back brilliantly after suffering initial disappointment with a 15th-place finish in the all-around final.

The comeback ushered in one of the most revered artistic gymnastics careers of all time, with further high points including another Olympic gold medal and 20 World Championship medals as Khorkina became the first gymnast in history to win three all-around world titles.

Khorkina’s main specialties were the uneven bars and balance beam, and she left a legacy with at least nine moves named after her mainly in those disciplines, in addition to a few spread across floor exercises and the vault.

The first couple – the Khorkina and the Khorkina 2 – come in the uneven bars and involve half-turn hangs. In the former, Khorkina started with a back uprise and then made a straddle flight over the high bar. In the latter, she had inner front support on the low bar, formed a clear hip circle to handstand, then impressively half-turned in full flight to hang on the high bar. There is another move called the Khorkina-Chow or Chow-Khorkina, which was first performed by Amy Chow and is a Stadler one-and-a-half pirouette.

In the 1, 2 and 3 balance beam moves named after her, Khorkina dismounted the apparatus and performed either a full twist, a gainer two-and-a-half twist, or gainer triple twist. In the Khorkina 1 and 2 moves on the vault, there were also plenty of twists and turns with ‘the Khorkina’ in the floor exercise similarly involving a hop with one and a half turns.

Four of these skills are currently listed in the Code of Points (CoP), with Khorkina previously holding the record for the most eponym moves (nine) before some of them were removed ahead of the 2022-2024 quad as part of a regular CoP update.

‘The Besti Squat’ – figure skating

Natalia Bestemianova was a Soviet figure-skating icon who, while overseen by legendary coach Tatiana Tarasova, made her name in the 1980s alongside her partner Andrei Bukin as a four-time world and five-time European champion.

After suffering silver-medal disappointment at the 1984 Winter Olympics in Sarajevo, she finally struck gold in Calgary four years later. 

It was throughout 1988 that ‘the Besti Squat,’ unofficially named after Bestemianova, gained prominence as she used it repeatedly in her free dance with Bukin. 

The move resembles the spread eagle, given that the skater who executes it glides along an edge with both skates on the ice.

The toes are turned out to the sides with the heels facing one another, and the knees are then bent outwards to a squatting position with the torso upright and thighs parallel to the ice.

While ‘the Besti Squat’ has become a popular move still used four decades later, not everyone approved of Bestemianova’s performances at the time. Reporting from the 1988 Winter Games, the New York Times claimed that Bestemianova and Bukin’s free dance program “suggested they might take the prize for vulgarity as well,” and that the endless debate as to whether ice dance is sport or art had come to a rest.

“Her aggressiveness did not agree with a submissive image and the pair’s overall harsh style made no sense of the spliced-in moves – especially the spread eagle or plie,” it was stated.

Given that the routine landed her gold, however, it is doubtful that Bestemianova, who later became a TV personality on the Russian equivalent of ‘Dancing on Ice,’ cared too much.

The Moscow native was perhaps ahead of her time, with out-of-touch critics falling wide of the mark. 

‘The Karelin Lift’ – wrestling

Known as the ‘Russian Bear’, ‘Russian King Kong’, ‘the Experiment’, and ‘Alexander the Great’, Aleksandr Karelin retired in 2000 widely considered to be the greatest wrestler of all time – and among the most dominant athletes ever seen in any sport.

Karelin scooped gold at three consecutive Olympic Games from 1988-1996 and put together a monstrous 887-2 record. He claimed silver in his last Games in Sydney in 2000.

Such was Karelin’s dominance, there were inevitable claims that he used PEDs – although the athlete himself put his phenomenal record down to something else. “No one can completely believe that I am natural. The most important drug is to train like a madman – really like a madman. The people who accuse me are those who have never trained once in their life like I train every day of my life,” he once said.

Given his undisputed reign at the top of his sport, it should be no surprise that Karelin had a move named after him. Known as the ‘Karelin Lift,’ it saw him hold his hapless opponents in the air with his enormous reach and then body-slam them into the mat.

The reverse body lift frequently saw Karelin awarded five points when executed properly, which was the maximum in the sport. The move started while his foe was lying flat on his back on the mat. Once wrapped up in Karelin’s grasp, opponents found it impossible to wriggle free from a  grip described as “anaconda-like.”

While it had long been used, Karelin made the lift his own. He was the first heavyweight to add it to his arsenal and wowed the wrestling world by demonstrating it on opponents weighing up to 130kg (285lbs).

‘The Kabaeva’ – rhythmic gymnastics

One of the most decorated gymnasts in the history of the rhythmic facet of the sport, Alina Kabaeva won Olympic gold in Athens in 2004 after disappointment in Sydney four years earlier, where she had been widely expected to win the all-around event as the reigning world champion but made a costly error.

Kabaeva boasts 14 World Championship medals and 21 at the European Championships from the late 90s and into the 2000s, but her contributions to her discipline go beyond any silverware amassed since becoming European champion as a 15-year-old prodigy.

Kabaeva revolutionized rhythmic gymnastics by introducing new skills and moves. There are no fewer than four named after her, which have been given Roman numerals to distinguish them.

The ‘Kabaeva I’ is a ring leap she performed with both legs, but the ‘Kabaeva II’ is arguably her most famous, involving a backscale pivot from a standing or grounded position. 

Kabaeva was the first to perform the backscale pivot, but her other two moves (the ‘Kabaeva III and IV’) saw her balance with support from her chest and split with hand support.

The 39-year-old, who later ventured into politics, is still known as one of the most flexible athletes to ever grace the mats, and it’s not difficult to see why after a recap of the maneuvers she brought to the continental and global stage. 

Lev Yashin remains revered as a benchmark of goalkeeping excellence

The world of football was cast into mourning last December with the passing of Pele, one of the undisputed greats of the game. The death of the Brazilian legend led to tributes from far and wide, as fans reflected on the impact of a man who changed the face of his sport.

Russia was no exception, and the men’s national team paid its respects by sharing a poignant image of a smiling Pele. But alongside the legendary forward was another man who earned revered status as part of the same generation – the late, great Lev Yashin.

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While Pele made his name scoring goals, Yashin forged his reputation by preventing them. A shot-stopper unlike any who had come before him, the Russian remains a benchmark for goalkeeping brilliance, more than 50 years after he played his last game and over three decades after his death.

If Pele would be selected to spearhead the attack in many football fans’ all-time fantasy eleven, the name widely picked in goal would surely be Yashin.

Nicknamed ‘The Black Spider’, ‘The Black Octopus’, and ‘The Black Panther’ because of his feats of acrobatics and the color of his on-pitch attire – topped off with a trademark flat cap – Yashin was a pioneer as an imposing Soviet shot-stopper who enjoyed a storied 20-year career.

Such was his renown, Yashin gives his name to the title annually bestowed on the world’s best goalkeeper by the respected France Football magazine.

Monday, March 20, marks 33 years since Yashin’s passing at the age of 60, and will be a day when many reflect on the remarkable life and times of Russia’s greatest football idol.

Working class hero    

Born in Moscow on October 22, 1929, into a family of industrial workers, Yashin did not seem destined for footballing immortality. He was not yet a teenager when he started his own factory labors, helping the Russian effort during World War II. Yashin continued his factory work after the war, but suffered what was described as a “nervous breakdown” at age 18 as the experience took its toll. 

“Was it depression? I don’t know,” Yashin wrote in his autobiography. “The fatigue accumulated over the years began to make itself felt and something in me suddenly broke. At that time I felt nothing except emptiness.”

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Sport, however, was to be a vital outlet and would open up new opportunities for the young Yashin. Already a keen football and ice hockey player, he was advised by a teammate to volunteer for military service, something which he  described as his “salvation” as he combined football with his new duties.

After being scouted in 1949, Yashin was invited to join the youth ranks of Dynamo Moscow – one of the Russian capital’s powerhouse football clubs, which had caused a stir with a groundbreaking tour of the UK in 1945 during which the team impressively went unbeaten in four games against supposedly superior home opposition.

Yashin, however, was not to enjoy an auspicious start when he made his debut for Dynamo in 1950, letting in a soft goal that partly contributed to him only playing two league games that year. Also in his way was Alexei ‘Tiger’ Khomich, a revered figure who would keep Yashin out of the team during the early part of his career.

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Rather than seek a pathway to regular first-team football elsewhere, Yashin became hellbent on making it to the top at Dynamo. He even played as a goaltender for Dynamo’s ice hockey team, winning the Soviet Cup in 1953, showing his versatility as an all-round athlete.

“I ran, did the high jump, shot put, discus, took fencing lessons, had a go at boxing, diving, wrestling, skating, tried basketball, played ice hockey, water polo, and football. I spent my winters on skis and skates. I’m not sure what I was best at,” Yashin later recalled. 

Hitting the big time

Biding his time with his football career, Yashin finally managed to oust Khomich from the Dynamo starting eleven when the latter was injured in 1953. Yashin was to make the position his own, embarking on a glittering era for Dynamo which would ultimately yield five Soviet league titles – four of which came between 1954-59 – and three Soviet Cups.

Yashin’s initial success at Dynamo meant the Soviet national team soon came calling. He received his first international call-up in 1954 in a 7-0 win against Sweden, with the next four years truly providing his breakthrough to the big time with glory at Dynamo and gold with the USSR at the 1956 Olympics.

In 1958, an even bigger football audience took note of Yashin at the World Cup in Sweden. His ‘sweepers-keeper’ approach – since popularized again by the likes of Manuel Neuer, Alisson, and Marc-Andre ter Stegen – came to the forefront, as did his ability to read the game. 

Yashin crossed paths with a 17-year-old Pele and eventual champions Brazil in the group stage. Though the Selecao won 2-0, Yashin limited the South Americans’ account from growing through a string of top saves.

The USSR crashed out in the quarterfinals against the hosts, but Yashin was voted goalkeeper of the tournament, with journalists worldwide hailing him as the best in the game.

Two years later, he made up for heartache in Scandinavia by leading the Soviets to the title at the inaugural European Championships in France. The tournament in 1960 was then known as the European Nations Cup, and Yashin kept a clean sheet in the semifinal as the Soviet Union beat Czechoslovakia 3-0. 

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In the final at the Parc des Princes against Yugoslavia, Yashin saved two free-kicks before being beaten by a deflected shot that connected with his captain Igor Netto. In extra time, Yashin made vital interventions as Yugoslavia tried to equalize Viktor Ponedelnik’s 113th-minute winner.

The celebrations were relatively tame in Paris, with runner-up Dragan Sekularac claiming that the “crowds in France wanted western European glamor, not mysterious teams from the other side of Europe” as he commented on the sparse attendance at a reception held at the Eiffel Tower. But upon their return to Moscow, the Soviet team was celebrated like heroes by over 100,000 of their compatriots at a victory parade held in the Central Lenin Stadium (now known as Luzhniki).

Bouncing back

Yashin’s heroics in Paris were the glory before a fall. At the 1962 World Cup, his errors against Colombia resulted in the game ending 4-4 before the highly fancied Soviets were eliminated at the quarterfinal stage once more by falling to hosts Chile 2-1. 

“I was in disbelief that I’d scored past the great Lev Yashin,” Eladio Rojas, who embraced the ‘keeper instead of his teammates, said years later. “I still am. I was overcome with excitement that all I wanted to do was hug him. Scoring past Yashin was like a trophy.”

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Yashin was made the scapegoat for the exit in Arica and was branded a “fading force” by L’Equipe. He would likely have been mentally tortured by Rojas and his blunders against Colombia, once posing: “What kind of a goalkeeper is one who is not tormented by a goal he has conceded?”

“He must be tormented! And if he is calm, that means the end. No matter what he had in the past, he has no future,” added Yashin, of whom it was later revealed had suffered a concussion in the match against Chile.

As all greats do, Yashin made a comeback for the ages by first leading Dynamo to another league title in 1963 and becoming the first and only goalkeeper ever to claim France Football’s Ballon d’Or for the best player in Europe. Yashin credited the spectacular saves he made during an England versus Rest of the World match at Wembley, where Pele was mysteriously absent, with prolonging his career and earning him the award months after the 2-1 loss in a game to mark 100 years of the English Football Association.

Considering it to be his greatest achievement at the time, Yashin officially received his Ballon d’Or ahead of a European Championship quarterfinal second leg against Sweden in May 1964, in a match the USSR won 3-1 in front of around 100,000 fans in Moscow. The Soviets would go on to reach the final of the tournament in Spain, but were edged out 2-1 by the hosts in Madrid.

Yashin’s international journey continued at the 1966 World Cup in England, though he missed the first two matches due to injury. After returning to action, he led the Soviets to a best-ever fourth place finish following a semifinal loss to West Germany. 

Hanging up his gloves

Completing two decades of loyal service to Dynamo and over a decade-and-a-half to his country, Yashin hung up his gloves in 1970 after traveling to his final World Cup in Mexico, where he acted as an assistant coach and third-choice back-up.

“I don’t know if one man has ever meant so much to one club,” said former Dynamo teammate Igor Chislenko, who along with Yashin was a rare breed as a one-club man.

But Yashin meant more to football than simply his allegiances to one club or country. At his testimonial in 1971, 103,000 fans reportedly turned out to see him play for Dynamo one last time against a European team captained by England and Manchester United legend Bobby Charlton. 

Pele and Eusebio were also present, and joined the throngs of respected figures that spoke with reverence of a man who bowed out after setting a record of more than 150 penalty saves (“the joy of seeing Yuri Gagarin flying in space is only superseded by the joy of a good penalty save,” Yashin once said) and keeping around 275 clean sheets.

“Someone once said that a team with Pele started [a game] with a 1-0 lead. A team with Yashin started winning 2-0,” Pele explained.

“He made me as a footballer. When you’re able to score against the greatest goalkeeper in the history of world football, you remember it for your whole life. You realize that you can score against anyone,” said Portuguese great Eusebio.

England’s 1966 World Cup winner Gordon Banks, regarded as one of the greatest shot-stoppers of all time, likewise hailed his Russian counterpart. “Lev Yashin was first-class, a real super goalkeeper. Everything he did was top-class. He was the model for goalkeeping for the next ten to 15 years,” Banks said.

“I visualized myself doing some of the things he was doing. Even though I was already playing in the top division, I used to learn from him.”

One of a kind

France Football agreed with Yashin’s undoubted influence, saying that he “revolutionized the role of goalkeeper like no other before him by always being ready to act as an extra defender,” and by “starting dangerous counter-attacks with his positioning and quick throws” after demonstrating his prowess through plucking crosses out of the sky.

One of the original ‘sweepers-keepers’, he was also renowned for commanding from the back, bellowing instructions to teammates while often out of his area and taking part in build-ups. He could expertly read the game, anticipating the opposition striker’s movement and where his shot was destined, and his long arms earned him the nickname ‘the Black Spider’ while helping him reach top-corner shots. Despite his somewhat lanky 6ft 2in frame, Yashin was known as agile and athletic.

The same France Football magazine which handed Yashin the Ballon d’Or in 1963 and named its goalkeeping award after him unsurprisingly picked the Russian in its all-time Dream Team in 2020. In November 2003, to mark UEFA’s jubilee, the Russian Football Union selected him as its most outstanding player of the last 50 years to compliment the Order of Lenin award he received in 1967 for his outstanding services to his country and people.

Yashin was a man of the people who fans always called by his first name, said his successor at Dynamo, Vladimir Pilguy. “To them, he was one of them like a brother or a friend. He used to walk home from matches with masses of fans – he’d let them carry his sports bag,” Pilguy added.

Yet contrary to belief, Yashin wasn’t always the model pro that people thought. “My secret? Before a game I would smoke a cigarette to calm my nerves and down a nice vodka to tone my muscles,” he once revealed.

Despite his achievements, Yashin reportedly fell out with Dynamo in his later years, and in particular with chairman Piotr Bogdanov who boasted political clout that allegedly made Yashin unable to leave the country due to routine refusals to grant his wife a visa. 

Monuments to an icon 

Nonetheless, Yashin remains a revered figure at the club. Its stadium is known as the VTB Arena for sponsorship purposes, but also bears Yashin’s name and his statue can be found outside it. Dynamo’s players wore a retro kit to honor him on would have been his 92nd birthday in 2021 and continued the tradition in 2022. In 2019, Yashin’s heroics were brought to a new generation in the form of a film based on his life, ‘Lev Yashin: Dream Goalkeeper’.

Yashin, sadly, has not been around to witness many such tributes to his career. In 1986, a blood clot he suffered in his leg required it to be amputated, before he passed away in 1990 from stomach cancer complications at the age of 60, with his wife and two daughters by his side. 

It was during a European Cup match between Dnipro and Benfica in the Meteor Stadium that Yashin’s death was announced, reportedly bringing tears to the eyes of Portuguese icon Eusebio, who traveled as part of the Lisbon club’s delegation.

The striker, who is himself known as an all-time great of the game, called Yashin “the peerless goalkeeper of the century.” Many would find that hard to dispute, not only due to Yashin’s team and personal accolades, but also the sheer influence he had in his position.

In the pantheon of football icons, the Russian would surely lay claim to the number one shirt.