ITU (Brazil), June 19. /ITAR-TASS/. The Russian football team gathered for its first practice following their Tuesday’s match against South Korea (1-1) at the 2014 World Cup in Brazil, where the much anticipated global tournament kicked off on June 12.

The practice is held at the Novelli Junior stadium, located in Itu municipality, Sao Paolo state, with all Russian players from the team’s roster attending.

Local temperature currently dropped to 20 degrees Celsius (68 Fahrenheit) while it was never lower 25 degrees Celsius during the previous practices of the Russian squad, which also used to hold practices in hot weather in Moscow before the World Cup.

Being rumored to be the highest paid national coach in the world, Italian phenomenon Fabio Capello managed to help the Russian national team to qualify for the current World Cup in Brazil. He celebrated his 68th birthday during the Russia vs. South Korea match on Tuesday.

Capello’s squad will next face Russia’s old-time rivals Belgium, which earlier in the night felt comfortable defeating Algeria 2-1 at the Belo Horizonte Stadium. Russia’s game against Algeria is scheduled for June 26.

On the eve of the Russian team’s match against South Korea, the Russian state-run pollster VTsIOM provided data showing that 25% of Russians believed that the country’s national football team would battle through to the final match of the 2014 World Cup. Seven percent said the team would fail to clear the group stage.