Off to Russia? Embrace it and enjoy the show
YOU might say that England’s World Cup begins among old friends. The team start out in the city once known as Stalingrad — now renamed Volgograd — where Winston Churchill had a sword created for the people, in recognition of our gratitude for their extraordinary Soviet defence against the German 6th Army.
There i s more sentiment in Russia for the Soviet days than you might think. The English, facing Tunisia there, will be more welcome than you might think.
Though the memory is still vivid of Euro 2016’s Russian gangs, with their tool cutters and knuckle dusters, declaring war on English supporters in Marseille, the mob is expected to be silenced this time.
It is hard to over-state the importance to president Vladimir Putin of a positive external image for a tournament which the Kremlin’s propaganda machine projects as a sign of Russian greatness reborn.
Hooligans have been told they face between eight and 15 years behind bars. England fans can also expect far less chaotic organisation than we saw at the South African and Brazilian World Cups. Extra flights will be laid on and there will be free trains between venues for ticketholders, introducing visitors to Russia’s love of the overnight train journey.
My overnight trip from St Petersburg to Latvia in the summer revealed rudimentary facilities — one kettle per carriage, no buffet car and top bunks inviting minimal movement. But it was comfortable enough: an adventure which felt far safer than the onward road trip to Moscow, with eccentric road surfaces which made them barely navigable for the first few hours.
Those travelling match-to-match by train — Volgograd to Novgorod and on to Kaliningrad — would find both trips taking over a day, though s i x- day a nd f o ur- day br e a ks between England’s fixtures create scope to make a journey of it.
The onward trip to Kaliningrad takes in the Lithuanian capital, Vilnius. The Welcome2018. com website provides help. As The Mail
on Sunday revealed last month, senior British police are working hard to convey the message that respect for the hosts is necessary. There is a cult of nationalism which will make English fans a target if they launch into their songs about the British Empire, or insult Putin.
‘English supporters should think about this,’ Britain’s top British football police officer, Deputy Chief Constable Mark Roberts, told
The Mail on Sunday. ‘When you’re on other people’s turf, you play by their rules. You can’t complain about the consequences if you neglect to do that.’
The Russian streets are far less intimidating than those in Brazil, but Russia is a very ‘ white’ and mono-cultural country, where ethnicity is a novelty. There’s a genuine risk of players — English included — being subjected to racist chants. But England’s group-stage stadiums will be very much up to the job. Putin ropes in his personal friends in industry to undertake national infrastructure projects for events like this, in return for lucrative government contracts.
It’s regrettable for both team and fans that the group stage does not take England to Saint Petersburg — the most attractive of all venues and only 19 miles away from the FA’s base.
The more intrepid fans should get there anyway, to discover the network of canals which reflect the way it was designed to resemble Amsterdam, fine Georgian restaurants and the June sun which sets in the middle of the night, when the streets are still full.
This has the potential to be a journey rich in discovery, then — and delight, with group-stage opponents who have collectively only ever inflicted one defeat on England. Embrace it. What could possibly go wrong?