Fyodor Fyodorovich Cherenkov[1] (Russian: Фёдор Фёдорович Черенко́в; 25 July 1959 – 4 October 2014) was a Soviet and Russian football midfielder who played for Spartak Moscow (1977–90 and 1991–94) and Red Star Football Club (1990–91).
 Cherenkov in 2008 | |||||||||||||||||
| Personal information | |||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Full name | Fyodor Fyodorovich Cherenkov | ||||||||||||||||
| Date of birth | 25 July 1959 | ||||||||||||||||
| Place of birth | Moscow, Russian SFSR, Soviet Union | ||||||||||||||||
| Date of death | 4 October 2014 (aged 55) | ||||||||||||||||
| Place of death | Moscow, Russia | ||||||||||||||||
| Height | 1.78 m (5 ft 10 in) | ||||||||||||||||
| Position(s) | Midfielder | ||||||||||||||||
| Youth career | |||||||||||||||||
| 1969–1971 | Kuntsevo Moscow | ||||||||||||||||
| 1971–1977 | Spartak Moscow | ||||||||||||||||
| Senior career* | |||||||||||||||||
| Years | Team | Apps | (Gls) | ||||||||||||||
| 1977–1990 | Spartak Moscow | 344 | (86) | ||||||||||||||
| 1990–1991 | Red Star Saint-Ouen | 15 | (1) | ||||||||||||||
| 1991–1994 | Spartak Moscow | 54 | (9) | ||||||||||||||
| Total | 413 | (96) | |||||||||||||||
| International career | |||||||||||||||||
| 1979–1990 | Soviet Union | 34 | (12) | ||||||||||||||
| 1980–1983 | Soviet Union Olympic | 10 | (6) | ||||||||||||||
| Managerial career | |||||||||||||||||
| 1994–1995 | Spartak Moscow (assistant) | ||||||||||||||||
| 1996–1997 | Spartak Moscow (reserves assistant) | ||||||||||||||||
| 2013–2014 | Spartak Moscow (youth assistant) | ||||||||||||||||
Medal record
| |||||||||||||||||
| *Club domestic league appearances and goals | |||||||||||||||||
Playing career
editCherenkov played for Spartak Moscow for almost his entire professional club career (1977–1994; he also played for the youth team between 1971–1977), aside from a brief spell with Red Star Saint-Ouen from 1990–91. For the time spent in Spartak he received the Club Loyalty Award in 1989. He was awarded "The Attack Organizer" award in 1988 and 1989, as the most useful attack player.[2]
At international level, Cherenkov made 34 appearances for the Soviet Union national team, scoring 12 goals.[3] He won a bronze medal at the 1980 Summer Olympics. Although widely regarded by Spartak's fans as the team's best player ever, he was always dropped by the national team on the eve of several major tournaments, including two World Cups and a European Championship.
Style of play
editCherenkov was an excellent passer and was also a good striker of the ball who scored many goals throughout his career.[2] In his book on the history of Spartak, Robert Edelman described him as "the longest-serving and most beloved of all Spartakovtsy":
A native Muscovite, Fiodr Cherenkov (b. 1959) was a product of Spartak's school. Navigating between midfield and forward, he played with an originality and eccentricity that endeared him to the public. Cherenkov was an enigmatic and fragile personality whose capacity for unexpected improvisation fit the Spartak image of the player as romantic artist. A true original, he was the embodiment of what many of Spartak's male Moscow supporters liked to believe about themselves. Lacking great speed but quick on his feet, small of stature but possessed of great guile, Cherenkov seemed to practice a new kind of masculinity, that of the urban trickster. By the time his Spartak career was over, he was the leading point producer (goal plus pass) in the team's history.[4]
Cherenkov was considered to be the best Soviet footballer of the 1980s.[5]
Coaching career
editCherenkov worked as a coach of Spartak's reserve team after retiring.
Personal life and personality
editA 2021 profile on BBC Sport relates that Cherenkov was a kind and approachable "regular guy" who could not understand his own fame. He suffered several attacks of an unknown mental illness during his playing career, and missed important games because of it, but was "widely seen as the best Soviet footballer of the decade". His daughter Anastasia was born in 1980. He died in 2014, at age 55, after collapsing outside his home. An autopsy at a Moscow hospital found a brain tumour. The profile described him as a "football genius".[5]
Honours
editClub
editSpartak Moscow
- Soviet Top League: 1979, 1987, 1989
- Russian Premier League: 1993
- Russian Cup: 1994
International
editSoviet Union
Individual
edit- Soviet Footballer of the Year: 1983, 1989
- Club Loyalty Award: 1989
References
edit- ^ "Fyodor Cherenkov: The Soviet football genius the world never got to see". Michael Yokhin. BBC Sport. 28 January 2021. Retrieved 7 April 2021.
- ^ a b ""Организатору атаки"". hsf.narod.ru.
- ^ Matthias Arnhold (19 June 2009). "Fyodor Fyodorovich Cherenkov - International Appearances". Rec.Sport.Soccer Statistics Foundation. Retrieved 5 October 2014.
- ^ Robert Edelman, Spartak Moscow: A History of the People's Team in the Workers' State (Cornell University Press, 2012; ISBN 080146613X), p. 279.
- ^ a b Michael Yokhin (28 January 2021). "Fyodor Cherenkov: The Soviet football genius the world never got to see". BBC Sport.
External links
edit
- Fyodor Cherenkov at FootballFacts.ru (in Russian)
- Profile at RussiaTeam Archived 22 February 2006 at the Wayback Machine (in Russian)
- Fyodor Cherenkov's profile at Spartak's official website at the Wayback Machine (archived 2007-02-19) (in Russian)
- Fyodor Cherenkov at Olympedia (archive)
- Fyodor Cherenkov at Olympics.com
