Biography of Anton Azarov

Director Anton Azarov: “In the years, Lobanovsky tried to imitate the foreign players“ one of his nominees was the Ukrainian film “Lobanovsky Forever” by Anton Azarov. This is a documentary about the legendary coach of Dynamo Kyiv Valeria Lobanovsky, who for the first time in the history of Soviet sports brought his club to European football leaders. The film is based on documentary frames and memoirs of people who knew Valery Vasilyevich well.

Among them are famous athletes, cultural figures, politicians and even presidents. For the St. Petersburg director Anton Azarov, this is a debut in full -length documentary cinema.

By the way, shooting was carried out with the money of the film team, without state support. Thanks to the authors' own funds, the tape will be rented. Its premiere in Ukraine will be held on December 1. I hope the picture will become part of the story whose name is Lobanovsky. ” Including about the stadium, which now bears the name of Valery Lobanovsky. In every big city in the world there is a sports ground with its own unique story.

But soon we realized that the project cannot be implemented without powerful financing. And then we had the idea to make a film about the football coach of Valery Lobanovsky. Our desire was reinforced by the fact that so far a serious documentary has not been created about this legendary person. Four months took to finalize the details, and in December of the year our project started.

We just started working on a ribbon about a person who is known by millions. I am very far from football, and Simonov too. A professional in this matter is Sergey Polkhovsky. It was important for us to find the most objective view of everything related to Lobanovsky. In fact, I began to engage in the history of his life from scratch. I reviewed all the programs, re -read books, studied the chronicle.

I was even more far from hockey than from football. Football at least sometimes watched. By the way, the first time I got to the stadium in Kyiv. It was last year when the champions League qualified matches were going on. Of course, we really wanted the Dynamo Kiev to go further in the Champions League so that our film would be released in the wake of raising interest in football.

In this sense, we are very dependent on the Kyiv Dynamo. If they play poorly, this will also affect us. In our picture we analyze football to pieces. We are trying to understand what was the know-how of the Lobanovsky system, which arose back in Soviet times. In my opinion, both are pointless. At least, with regard to sports. When you look, say, a chronicle of x, you see fans at the stadium, you understand that they are absolutely not worried about political ideology.

Now the same thing. Lobanovsky achieved absolute success precisely in the system that was essentially completely anti -human, not allowing the opportunity to jump above the established bar. He reached the top contrary to everything. Lobanovsky is a huge cultural, social and historical layer connecting the whole generation of people who lived under the Soviet regime and at present.

This was able to do one person with incredible sports instinct and talent. Why is sport attracted to me - it has no nationalities and political color. Jozhef Sabo spoke about this time. Lobanovsky had a peculiar manner of the game - somewhat angular. He looked around how foreign football players play, he liked their relaxation on the field, and Lobanovsky tried to adopt it.

Each of our storytellers recalled something unusual, little-known from the life of the great coach. We have more than 20 heroes in our film. The cinema is built so that there is no sunbeam or host. To record stories, we worked in Kyiv, St. Petersburg, Madrid. We have statements by Michel Platini, Russian football commentator Gennady Orlov. The film has a fairly large amount of information that literally pours onto the viewer.

From one era we move to another, but the main thing is that Valery Vasilievich does not die in our film. Initially, we planned to make a block, conditionally calling it “time after Lobanovsky”, but then refused. Having watched the movie, each viewer himself will draw conclusions for himself about what remains after Lobanovsky. We mounted the film for almost six months, working out every minute.

Having come to the finish line, they realized how much they got rid of Lobanovsky. Because of this, they could not insert personnel, where people say goodbye to Valery Vasilyevich, experience his death. Despite the loss, we still feel the invisible presence of Valery Vasilievich in everything that concerns football. You can’t argue with this. Oleg Bazilevich, a player of Dynamo Kyiv, also agreed, despite the fact that by the time the record was seriously ill.

We came to his house, but Bazilevich could not talk to us. The son of Oleg was with him, and we recorded him. Our last hero was Andrei Shevchenko, whom they still could not catch. He dangled between Europe and Ukraine. In the end, we talked with him in Kyiv, at the Dynamo stadium. Without Andrew, the picture would be incomplete.He is a key figure in Lobanovsky.

On the basis of Dynamo, Sergey Rebrov was grabbed between training. We wanted an informal conversation that the heroes open from the unusual side. Sometimes for me it was more important not even the words of these people, but by expression of the eyes. I saw that some barely restrained tears when they talked about Valeria Vasilyevich. Mikhailichenko ate nothing for several days and still lost weight.

It was on the eve of one of the internal matches. Then the weather was bad, there was a strong wind. Mikhailichenko said that he physically felt his inability to fight the wind that simply blew him. People went to desperate acts, sometimes not understanding why. They believed so much in the correctness of the trainer’s decision that they did not even think to dispute him.

There was also an interesting story related to smoking. Once Lobanovsky removed one of the players from the matches. He, unable to stand it, came to the coach and said that he could no longer help but play. He dreams of football and he is so worried that he even quit smoking. Valery Vasilievich sent him for examination. Then he looked at the training data, said that they worsened, and ordered to start smoking again.

His thinking was non -standard. They recall that Lobanovsky was strict enough, one of his eyes were enough for the players. Nevertheless, he knew how to greatly discharge the atmosphere and joke. The coach surprisingly knew how to rally people around one idea. Unfortunately, few can create such an atmosphere now. For example, do not take women on a bus when the team is going somewhere.

He went to games in the same suit. In the nineties in the winter, for example, it was a tracksuit, sheepskin coat and cap. There were special rituals that the team made before the match. But Oleg Blokhin did not tell us about them, preserving this information as something very personal. The first time I arrived in Kyiv in the year. Actively shot for Ukrainian and Russian television channels.

Then he constantly wandered between Peter and Kyiv. And when the Maidan began, the issue with the move finally decided. It was a conscious decision. Kyiv is the city in which I want to live, love and work. Not all of relatives and friends accepted and understood my choice. But for myself, I finally parted with an illusion called "Moscow".