2023-11-25 07:15:19
“Everyone get on the bus!” shouts Viatcheslav Rol, covering with his voice the explosions that sound in the distance. Little soccer players between nine and eleven years old obey, pressed together on a freezing November morning.
That day the Krystal Kherson club, from Kherson, leaves the city in southern Ukraine that is bombed day following day by the Russian army. The players’ destination is Nicolaiev, 70 kilometers away, to participate in a tournament.
“Training helps them,” explains Viatcheslav, the 67-year-old coach. “They forget the bombs,” continues this man, who trains the twenty young women.
Kherson was occupied by the Russian army for eight months. Liberated on November 11, 2022 by Ukrainian forces, the city only experienced a brief respite as it suffers attacks every day that cause deaths and injuries.
“Herson! I dream of you every night!”: on the bus, the team sings one of their songs, while crossing a landscape of devastated streets.
In the midst of the bustle, Igor Psourtev, the club’s assistant coach, remembers the occupation. “I went door to door looking for young people, the city was empty,” explains this 60-year-old man. But “when she saw me, her eyes lit up,” the coach continues, pointing to a player he calls “Messi in a skirt.”
At half-time in a match, in Nicolaiev, another player dries her sweat with her blue and phosphor green t-shirt. Dana is eleven years old and very tall. She says that at first she didn’t like football, but that the war made her change. “I followed my friend who was practicing. She was so I wouldn’t stay locked up,” she says. Today, the girl “dreams” of being a professional.
Dana and her family now live in Odessa, since a “missile fell next to our house.” “I was very afraid, my father covered me with his body,” continues Dana, who continues playing for Jersón “because it is my city.”
On the playing field in Nicoaliev, with the players dressed to play, everyone sings the National Anthem with their hands over their hearts. Viatcheslav takes the floor to motivate his team before the match: “I see in front of me girls who remained strong during the bombings and who nothing has stopped them from playing football.”
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