ST. PETERSBURG, November 13. /TASS/. The national team of Peru would be glad to play a rematch against Russia, this time on its home turf, Arturo Rios, the vice president of the Peruvian Football Federation (FPF) told TASS.
Peru and Russia clashed on Wednesday night in a friendly match. In front of over 40,000 spectators at the Gazprom Arena in St. Petersburg, the teams played to a 1-1 draw.
"We would love to play with the Russian national team again. It's a great team," Rios said in an interview with TASS. "We would be happy to get on the field with them again in the future."
"Of course, it would be interesting if the Russian national team came to Peru and played against us there," he stated.
Russia’s lone goal on Wednesday came in the 18th minute of the game, when forward and team captain Alexander Golovin, who also plays for Monaco football club, put one in the back of the net.
With less than ten minutes remaining in the match, Peru’s striker Alex Valera netted a ball in the hosts' goal to tie the score at 1-1, which remained unchanged until the final whistle.
"The match against the Russians was very important for Peru," Rios continued. "We are currently reshuffling our team, a new generation of players are emerging," Rios continued. "Our team is made up mainly of players playing at the national championship level and so we watched this national squad play against the Russians with great interest."
"We knew coming in that the Russian national team is one of the best teams in the world," he said. "So, we expected a competitive game and of course, we knew that they had some strong players on their roster, one of them being Alexander Golovin from Monaco."
Prior to the November 12 match in St. Petersburg, Peru never played against Russia, but it did play three exhibitions against the Soviet Union in the early 70s. Two of the matches were held in the capital of Peru, Lima, in February 1970, with the first one ending in a scoreless draw and the second one 2-0 in favor of the USSR. The third match was played in the Soviet Union in April of 1972, when the Soviet team enjoyed a 2-0 win again.
This week on Saturday, the Russian football squad will play another friendly match against the national team of Chile in the Black Sea southern city of Sochi at the almost 45,000-seat capacity Fisht Stadium.
Russia’s football ban
The world’s governing football body, FIFA, announced on February 28, 2022, that the Russian national team and all professional clubs representing the country were barred from participating in FIFA tournaments.
In turn, the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) made a similar decision regarding the Russian national football team’s participation in UEFA tournaments.
Both FIFA and UEFA cited Russia’s special military operation in Ukraine as grounds for their respective bans on Russian teams’ participation in competitions.