The iconic Soviet football player Igor Netto would have turned 90 on 9 January 2020. The Matchweek 21 of the Russian Premier Liga will be dedicated to the memory of the Spartak and USSR national team legend.

Igor Netto helped forge the glory of Soviet and Russian football. With the captain's armband on his shoulder he led the Soviet team to the finals of the 1956 Olympic Games and the 1960 European Championships. Many experts consider him the greatest captain of the national team and Spartak in history. There were significant moments in his career thanks to which Netto earned unshakable authority among his peers and the absolute respect of fans.

Spartak style

At the age of 17, Igor Netto found himself at Spartak Moscow, and two years later he played his first official match for the main red-and-white team. Looking ahead, it is worth noting that Netto remained true to the horizontal diamond on his chest and the number 6 on his back to the end of his professional career.

Igor Alexandrovich played 405 games for Spartak (368 of them in the national championship) over a record 18 seasons. In a red and white shirt, Netto became the USSR champion five times and lifted the Soviet Cup three times. Spartak's style of play was perhaps the most recognizable and well-established. Short and medium passes, constant movement and runs, playing one-twos and excellent team interaction.

It is safe to say that none of this would have happened without the legendary number six. Contrary to popular belief, Netto was not the originator of such a game. The red-and-white midfielder did have a high passing culture, as noted by his teammates and players who faced Netto later. But Igor Alexandrovich is not the progenitor of the Spartacist style.

"This style, which is called "Spartacist", as Nikita Pavlovich [Simonyan] says, came from Nikolai Dementiev,” says the Director of the Spartak Museum Alexey Matveev. “This is their older friend, with whom they played together, and from whom they learned. Netto is a guide to the Spartacist style on the field.

“According to eyewitness accounts and what we know about him, Netto has always played football. He never shot the ball anywhere but tried to save it and continue the attack with a short and medium pass. If a teammate sent the ball anywhere, he immediately received a scolding from Igor Alexandrovich. He didn't like stupid football and didn't recognise it."

Netto remained true to his position of left midfield, where he played from his first official match. Igor Alexandrovich was not a winger in the modern sense. His position in the ‘W-M’ formation - which effectively featured five attackers - meant he had an active connection to attacks, as well as shifting to the center of the pitch and destroying opponents' attacks.

It is considered that in modern football, speed is higher and the workload for players is greater. Igor Netto is one of the best examples proving that in his era it was no less difficult to play and withstand loads.

"Everyone noted, including Nikita Pavlovich [Simonyan] - this is not just said in an interview - that he was equally good at both creating and destroying. Netto was good not only at passing, but also at dribbling. With five strikers in front, the midfielder had to participate in the teamwork," Matveev continued.

Captain of the Soviet Union

Probably the most significant moments in the biography of Igor Netto happened in the shirt of the Soviet Union national team. The midfielder took part in its first official match on 15 July 1952 against Bulgarian (a 2-1 win). Since 1954 - two matches after his debut for the national team - Netto always led the team to the pitch as captain, and this continued until the end of his international career.

In 2018, sports journalist and writer Boris Dukhon published a biography called "Igor Netto, Captain of the Soviet Union." As a member of the USSR team, Igor Alexandrovich brought the country its first Olympic gold medal and a victory in the European Championships, which is currently the only one for all post-Soviet countries.

Netto is one of three Spartak players who held a European Championships gold medal (alongside Anatoly Krutikov and Anatoly Maslenkin). He is one of the few to be champion of both the Olympics and the European Championships at the same time. There were only four of them: Lev Yashin, Anatoly Maslenkin, Valentin Ivanov and Igor Netto.

In 1988, the Netto Club was established for players who have played 50 or more matches for the national team. Igor Alexandrovich was the first to overcome this mark. In 1957, largely due to his remarkable performances for the national team, Netto became the first Spartak and one of the first Soviet players to make the top ten "Players of the year" by France Football magazine.

The famous story, which is often remembered when talking about Netto, happened when the midfielder played for the Soviet Union national team. The match against Uruguay in the 1962 World Cup was very difficult for the USSR. This meeting was decisive to reach the knockout stages of the World Cup.

Late in the second half, when the score was tied, Igor Chislenko’s shot hit the opponents' goal. The goal was given, but the Uruguayans were dissatisfied with this and began to protest. Igor Netto, having determined whether Chislenko had actually scored or not, went to the referee and pointed to the hole in the net.

The ball had flown into the goal not by crossing the line, but from the outside through the hole in the side netting. The goal was canceled, and Netto showed honesty and respect for the game and the opponent.

"If we still assume that we would have lost and not made it to the quarter finals - no, none of the guys would have dared to reproach Igor. After all, he acted honestly, nobly. And a victory obtained by dishonest means, in my opinion, does not bring satisfaction," recalled Victor Ponedelnik of the victory and the act of his captain.

The national team was loved and respected at that time. After winning the Olympic Games in Melbourne, the Soviet players went home triumphant on the ship. Netto himself remembered that 19-day trip with the warmest words. He talked about endless laughter and songs.

But with even greater warmth he remembered the reception of the team in their native land, in Vladivostok. The crew moored to the cheers of ships in the port. However, the long road to Moscow did not end at this reception. The players took a train and travelled to the capital for eight days.

Netto said that they were greeted by cheering fans at every station. Some climbed into the cars to greet the champions. Many carried treats and alcohol.

The victory in the European Championships was taken much more calmly, although now the tournament is more significant than the Olympics. Igor Alexandrovich calmly held the trophy in his hands during a solemn reception at the top of the Eiffel Tower and upon arrival in Moscow, where the country's leadership took the victory in France for granted.

Netto's career with the national team ended in May 1965, a year before the end of his professional football career. The success of the national team under his captaincy remains unsurpassed to this day.

Football hasn't gone anywhere

At 36, Igor Netto was left without football. But his favorite game did not let him go, and soon Igor Alexandrovich stood on the sidelines as a coach. In his new status, Netto also entered his name into the history of domestic sports. He was not an outstanding, award-winning coach, but he became the first Soviet coach to head a foreign team.

In 1967, the legendary player of Spartak and the USSR national team began coaching Omonia in Cyprus. Abroad, it should be noted, it did not work out. After Cyprus, there was Spartak again, but this time it was hockey.

At the beginning of his career as a professional athlete Igor Alexandrovich chose between the two most popular sports in the Soviet Union at that time: football and bandy. At its end, Netto was in charge of the red-and-white ice hockey team.

Football for the legendary Spartak number six was not over. Netto was at the helm of Shinnik, the Iranian national team, Panionios and Neftchi Baku, as well as being a youth coach at Spartak. He instilled in the young Spartacists the same legendary style, culture of passing, and speed of decision-making on the field. Igor Shalimov - one of his pupils - recalled that the coach could get very angry because of a sloppy pass.

Until the last days of his life Netto was a conductor of the Spartak style and the spirit of the red and white. To this day, he remains a captain of the Soviet Union and a record holder.

Igor Netto died on March 30, 1999, but his memory is still alive. In 2011, Spartak opened a memorial plaque in memory of Igor Alexandrovich on the facade of the house on the Taras Shevchenko embankment where he lived from 1955 to 1997.

Netto left behind an autobiographical book "This is Football", while his gold medals from the Melbourne Olympics, the 1960 European Championships and the USSR Championships were transferred to the club museum, where anyone can see them today.