Russians pitch national team ‘club’ for domestic Premier League

Fabio Capello

September 25 – Russia is building more than stadia and infrastructure for the 2018 World Cup. Next week the Russian Football Union’s (RFU) working group tasked with preparing a competitive team for the championship will meet to discuss a raft of suggestions to improve the competitiveness of the national team.

High on the list is a proposal to enter a Russian national team (potentially a youth team but perhaps the full national team) into the domestic league, and have them coached by national team coach Fabio Capello.

First proposed in a raft of discussion ideas proposed by RFU Sports Director Nikolai Pisarev and RFU Secretary General Anatoliy Vorobyov, RFU First Vice President Nikita Simonyan said he will press Capello on the suggestion.

Capello, who will be at the working group meeting, has said that the idea is a “beautiful, but utopian idea.”

One proposal suggested that a new club would be formed allowing youth players permanent game practice in the run-up to the World Cup. A similar initiative proposes that a new team in the league would be made up of the full national team squad.

Vorobyov argues that a core team of national players competing in the domestic championship would be the best way of ensuring improved national performance – the team could possibly be named ‘Russia-2018’.

Russia failed to qualify for the 2006 World Cup in Germany and 2010 championship in South Africa but did qualify for 2104 but didn’t progress beyond the group stages.

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