Russia recover World supremacy

Receiving the Intercontinental Cup trophy from the hands of football legend Diego Armando Maradona is quite a sweet way to get yourself on top of the Beach Soccer world again… And if you do it in such a brilliant fashion as Russia did today, giving Brazil no chance, then the whole thing comes even better. Mikhail Likhachev’s team had targeted this Samsung Beach Soccer Intercontinental Cup Dubai 2012 as their opportunity to ascend to an uncontestable dominant position, after the defeats suffered in the Euro Beach Soccer League and the final of the European Qualifier for the FIFA Beach Soccer World Cup2013, and they absolutely accomplished the mission.

The strong pace the defending champions imposed in the beginning of the match got them remarkable dividends. Already in the first period, the tsars had built a 3-0 advantage that had the canarinha on the robes. The tournament’s MVP, Shaykov, completed his second consecutive goal-poker in two days to widen the distance to 5-0 by mid second period. Only the efforts by Fernando DDI kept offering some resistance to such a tyrannical dominion, but his first two goals, which got him awarded as the competition’s top scorer, were far not enough to contest the strength the World Champions were fielding.

In the last minutes of the game, Brazil tried to dress up the score a bit, and Bruno Malias and André fired home for the 7-4. That was the only concession the Russians were to make, and time ran out without giving the Verdeamarela any other real chance to revert the situation. With the final whistle, Likhachev’s side wins all credit back, not only for having conquered this new edition of the Samsung Beach Soccer Intercontinental Cup Dubai, but specially because of the way they have achieved so. Was last summer just a little impasse? Today, it seemed it was, but only time will tell.

Goals: 1-0: Makarov, min. 7 (1); 2-0: Shaykov, min. 6 (1); 3-0: Shaykov, min. 0 (1); 4-0: Shaykov, min. 9 (2); 5-0: Shaykov, min. 3 (2); 5-1: Fernando DDI, min. 2 (2); 6-1: Shishin, min. 1 (2); 7-1: Makarov, min. 8 (3); 7-2: Fernando DDI, min. 6 (3); 7-3: Bruno Malias, min. 5 (3); 7-4: Andre, min. 0 (3);

SAMSUNG BEACH SOCCER INTERCONTINENTAL CUP DUBAI 2012

Results today

19:15 –Nigeria 7-8(et) UAE (3rd/4th place)

20:30 – Russia 7-4 Brazil (FINAL)

Final standings

Winner: RUSSIA

Runner-ups: Brazil

3rd place: UAE

Individual awards

MVP: Egor Shaykov (RUS)

Top Scorer: Fernando DDI (BRA), 10 goals

Best Goalkeeper: Andrei Bukhlitskiy (RUS)

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