Mini-football tournament among blind players held in Crimea

In Simferopol, the 9th anniversary of the All-Crimean referendum was celebrated with a mini-football tournament among blind players. The competition was attended by men’s and youth teams from Moscow, Nizhny Novgorod, Krasnodar, Novorossiysk, Simferopol, the Moscow region and the Donetsk People’s Republic.

Today, the diagnosis of an ophthalmologist is not a sentence for people with disabilities. Visually impaired, totally blind people can devote their lives to sports and spend their leisure time actively. The football of special players is no less dynamic than what we usually see.

The first football competition for the blind took place in 1986 in Spain. In Russia, this sport appeared much later – in 2004, and in the Crimea – quite recently: a year and a half ago. It was brought to us by the chairman of the KRO of the All-Russian physical culture and sports public organization of the disabled “Federation of Blind Football Players”, the director of the Simferopol special boarding school No. 1 Lyubov Bevz.

– Having returned after the conference of the Federation of Blind Football Players of the Russian Federation, I decided that such a sport should appear in the Crimea, – Bevz recalls. – In a short time we have created a children’s and adult team. On the basis of the Simferopol special boarding school No. 1, we train two teams – girls and boys. And this is our third tournament. The adult team performed in Nizhny Novgorod in September, and will go to Moscow in May. Kids in April go to the tournament in the capital, where 7 teams from all over Russia will play.

Lyubov Kudenko, director general of the Simferopol production association Krymplast, told how the Crimean team of blind football players was created.

“Our lawyer Evgeny was the first to catch fire,” says the general director with a smile. – He pulled the guys from the shop. There is a school near the enterprise, we agreed to play on their field. We bought a uniform, a ball. There were more applicants, but not all were selected. Most of us are blind, and the game is traumatic, so our guys are not yet as rushed into the fight as the Moscow teams.

By the way, blind athletes are not limited to football. Recently, a tennis tournament was held, in which an employee of Krymplast won.

Blind football is played according to the rules of futsal. The main difference is a sound ball with rattles inside, the sound of which is guided by a blind football player. An important element of the game is the blindfold. There are totally blind people, and there are those with residual vision, and in order to equalize everyone, they put on a blindfold. The peculiarity of the match is emphasized by the boards on the borders of the field – they are needed for the safety of the players. But the Crimean footballers have to do without them. We hope that one of the friends of blind football, and there are many of them – this is the Ministry of Sports, and deputies of the State Council, and the Board of Trustees – will respond and acquire them for the team.

As for the composition. There are five people in the team, the goalkeeper is visually impaired. In this football, one cannot do without a coach, a “guide” on the field: he is behind the goal and all the time prompts the players so that they understand where to move, where to shoot. The player is required to concentrate: to distinguish the voices of his guys, not to lose the ball, to think over the course of the game – and do all this with lightning speed.

“Many have their noses broken, their teeth knocked out. The kids are passionate about football. And fights happen. Everything is like in ordinary football, – says Nikolai Beregovoy, president of the All-Russian Federation of Blind Football Players.

Beregovoy recalls that since 2004, 16 regions have played special football. Over time, the number has decreased. But recently, two new football teams from Crimea have joined the federation.

– Now the most important region for us is Crimea. Not every subject of Russia has an adult and a children’s team, – says Nikolai Nikolaevich. – With great pleasure we come. And it has already become a good tradition to hold a tournament on the anniversary of the referendum.

According to the founder of football for the blind in the Russian Federation, 4 countries have won the right to be the best in the world: Brazil, Argentina, China and Russia. And it is very unfair that the Russian team of blind football players was not allowed to the European Championship. Someone will say that sanctions were applied to the most vulnerable category of people. And we will say differently: they removed strong rivals.

According to the results of the tournament among children’s teams, the first place was taken by the team “Dream” (Simferopol), the second – “Volga” (Nizhny Novgorod), the third – “Moscow” (Moscow). In adult teams, Zvezda (Moscow region) became the best, Chernomorets (Novorossiysk) took second place, Krasnodar (Krasnodar) came third. Our team “Krymplast” became the fourth, and the guests from Donetsk – the team “Donbass” took the fifth place in the standings.

Published in the newspaper “Moskovsky Komsomolets” No. 14 dated March 29, 2023

Newspaper headline:
A GAME FOR EVERYONE