Lev Yashin: The Black Spider
Вот революция в футболе:
вратарь выходит из ворот
и в этой новой странной роли
как нападающий идет.
Here’s a revolution in football:
the goalkeeper exits the goal
and in this new strange role
walks like an attacker.
Yevgeney Yevtushenko, “The Goalkeepr Exits the Goal”.
Six feet two, a flat cap, head to toe in black, with a Dynamo Moscow pin — Lev Yashin, also known as “The Black Spider”. Born in Moscow in 1929, Lev Yashin is still widely recognised as the best goalkeeper in the history of football. Not only because he forever changed the course of the game, specifically the goalkeeper position, but also because of his impeccable sportsmanship, unfaltering bravery and incredible life story.
When World War Two began in the Soviet Union, Yashin was only 12 years old, and he was sent to work in an arms factory to aid the war effort. In his early career, Yashin not only played football, but he was also an accomplished goalkeeper in hockey, helping the Dynamo team win the Soviet cup in 1953. After the war ended, Yashin suffered from a nervous breakdown and nearly quit all sports. Yet he continued his football career with Dynamo up until 1970.
Before Yashin, the goalkeeper remained in the goal for the whole game, and the position was often overlooked. He was the first ever goalkeeper to walk out of the penalty area and defend the goal, as well as shouting orders at his teammates - a football tactic that we now take for granted. Back then, his teammates and coaches thought that Yashin’s play was uncanny, and encouraged him to stop trying to deviate from how the game was meant to be played. But thanks to Yashin, we now have the riveting game of football that we all know and love today.
Over his 20 year career, Yashin saved 151 penalties, a record that is still yet to be broken, and kept over 270 clean sheets. He also remains the only goalkeeper to ever receive the prestigious Ballon d’Or award for player of the year in 1963. To score a goal past Yashin was a victory in and of itself, and he received praise and acknowledgement as the best goalkeeper to ever set foot on the field from the likes of the Brazilian football legend Pelé. Although multiple clubs from the West attempted to pouch Yashin, offering him million dollar deals, his loyalties lay with Dynamo Moscow, the only club that he has ever played for.
Yashin passed away at the age of 60 in 1990 due to stomach cancer. However, years before his death, both of his legs were amputated due to thrombophlebitis that he contracted because of his smoking habit. Back when the West had already developed titanium prosthetics, Yashin was given prosthetics made out of wood, since the USSR did not have access to this newer type of prosthetic. In his final year of life, Yashin was awarded the Soviet Union “Hero of Labour” award, which Gorbachev himself was meant to present to him at his Moscow apartment which he did not step foot out of in his last years. However, Gorbachev never came to Yashin’s home, and instead sent a deputy to present the award to him. Yashin’s first and only wife, Valentina, still lives in that same apartment…
Today, Dynamo’s VTB arena which hosted the 2018 World Cup is named the “Lev Yashin Stadium”, and Yashin remains both a sports and cultural legend around the world. Songs, such as Vladimir Vysotsky’s “Вратарь” (“Goalkeeper”) have been dedicated to Yashin, as well as a recent movie on his life titled “The Goalie of my Dreams”. He has also been included in FIFA’s Ultimate Team and the FIFA Lev Yashin award for the best goalkeeper was established in his honor posthumously.
Lev Yashin was never just a sportsman, he has, and always will be, an image of revolution and resistance, of courtesy and pride, and of perseverance even in the face of doubt and judgment. Thank you Mr Yashin for giving us this game of football — you are the goalie of my dreams!
И у мячей бывают слезы,
на штангах расцветают розы
лишь для такого вратаря!
And balls can have tears,
roses bloom on goal posts
only for a goalkeeper like this!
Yevgeney Yevtushenko, “The Goalkeepr Exits the Goal”.
