Goalkeeper Rodina Alexey Gorodovoy shared his memories of playing for Yakutia in the 2013/14 season.
We lived in a hotel opposite the stadium, the type of rooms. I remember my grandmother’s classic sagging sofa! In the cold, before going to bed, I put on thermal underwear, trousers, two pairs of socks, a T-shirt, a sweater and under the blanket.
We played in the cold, minus 10-12 degrees. Afterwards I became seriously ill several times, with a fever hovering around forty. You wear a thermal shirt, hit the ball a couple of times, you just fall, all wet. And you play the whole game wet, on a dubak. It’s a tough place, few Yakut football players got up and walked out of there.
Did the time difference get in the way? Ooh! We newcomers lived according to Moscow time. We woke up at three or four in the afternoon, went to breakfast – and the strange guys were already drinking vodka at the nearby tables! It’s cold, what else to do there? The only good thing about Yakutsk is the new cinema. When it opened, it seemed like we went there every day.
