Stories of famous hockey players from the past often appear on Sport24. We talked about Firsov’s life path recently, and now it’s teammate Viktor Polupanov’s turn.

Hockey combined with football

Like most Soviet children, young Polupanov was fond of two sports, in which interest depends on the time of year – football was the favorite game of young athletes in the summer, and hockey was preferred in the winter. But Victor was not an ordinary gardener who went out in the evenings to dribble ball or puck – from an early age he played hockey in the Novator factory team in Khimki and was the constant captain there.

Lev Yashin drew attention to the man who managed to successfully combine the two sports. And for a long time, Polupanov managed to follow the path of the famous goalkeeper – he played hockey for the youth team of CSKA, and broke the allied championship in the troika with Vladimir Vikulov and Viktor Eremin, and the promising young man played football. Dynamo school. But over time, Victor was faced with a choice – professional hockey with constant football was impossible. Then the striker decided to concentrate only on the puck game. Convincing the guy to continue his football career, Yashin did not like this very much.

“Anatoly Tarasov decided to create a new shock connection in the CSKA and Union team and “tied” me and Vikulov to Anatoly Firsov. I had to “tie” with football, but when Lev Ivanovich Yashin found out about this, he was upset: “Why do you need this, Vitya?” But in hockey I was already “sick”– said our hero.

At the age of 19, he participated in the World Championship for the first time.

His results soared after Polupanov removed football from his schedule and concentrated solely on hockey. Rapid progress made it possible to take a place in the heart of CSKA and go to the World Cup in 1966 – at that time the talented striker was only 19 years old. Victor went on the ice with Vikulov and Firsov in a troika, and by all guesses, their connection was to become the leader of the USSR national team at the world championship. And so it happened: The striker scored 28 goals in three, showing one of the best results in that World Cup.

The trio Polupanov – Firsov – Vikulov was unique in that each of them had their own strengths and ideally complemented their partners: Firsov was a typical “clever girl” and a professor on the ice, Vikulov was famous for his unique stick-holding technique, and Polupanov because of speed, strength and power He was responsible for the power component when playing offense.

US skater blessed for Olympic gold

At the end of December 1967, an interesting event happened to Victor. The USSR national team participated in the traditional tournament in memory of former IIHF President Walter Brown, held in Colorado Springs, in the eastern United States. At the same time and in the same place, American figure skaters were preparing for the Olympics, including the famous Olympic champion and three-time world champion Peggy Fleming. There was a birthday on July 27, and Polupanov was sent to congratulate the great athlete on behalf of the Soviet team. After these congratulations, Fleming won the gold of the Olympics.

“He was finishing his performance and we were getting ready to go on the ice. They gave me a bouquet of flowers. I went out, gave it to him, kissed him on the cheek. It was impossible to do more, he wished him “good varnish”. It turned out that he won gold in Grenoble with my consent. And he gave me a souvenir. He gave me an autographed photograph.”– said forward.

Vysotsky sang about him

The 1966 World Cup became a turning point for Polupanov, because only this world championship was the debut in his career. Thanks to the tournament in Yugoslav Ljubljana, Victor got into the song of one of the greatest artists and poets in the history of our country – Vladimir Vysotsky. The reason why the Soviet team stood out in the hit “Pros” was the moment of the match between the national teams of the USSR and Canada. One of the main stars of the founders of hockey in this tournament was three-time Stanley Cup winner and world champion Carl Brewer. The Maple Leaves defender decided to play hard against Firsov, where Polupanov immediately stood up and put Brewer firmly to the side – the result of the skirmish was a broken eyebrow and cheek of the Canadian. It was this moment that Vysotsky described in the song “The Professionals”:

“First it was straight, then a Band-Aid, and luckily the priests. Before the fight, they knew they were weak, they prayed in order – it didn’t help! ”