Russia “buys” a tournament for the national team to play
Since Russia decided to invade Ukraine more than a year ago, its soccer team and Russian clubs have been banned from the World Cup and other competitions organized by FIFA and UEFA.
In this long “rest”, the team led by Valery Karpin will be able to play against Iran and Iraq, two of the few remaining “allied” countries. And another opportunity has appeared on the horizon: CAFA (Central Asian Football Federation) has decided to invite Russia to the first edition of the tournament organized by it, which takes place from June 9 to 21.
Tajikistan, Iran, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan, Afghanistan and Russia will be the participating countries. Faridun Saliev, Press Secretary of the Tajikistan Federation, announced that Russia has accepted the invitation, although the terms of participation are still being discussed. It doesn’t look like there will be any problem because the tournament seems to be manufactured so that Russia can compete after a long time without doing something like that.
The major sponsor of the event is the company Gazprom, the largest company in all of Russia. Gazprom was also one of UEFA’s big clients, until the war with Ukraine ended that relationship. In Moscow, they initially planned to leave the highest European body and join the Asian Confederation, but this plan was not realized.
For now, the Russians will compete in friendly tournaments such as CAFA, while the Russian women’s national under-17 team is playing in the South Asian Football Federation (SAFF) Championship this week.
