There was an event in Soviet football, which was both significant and mysterious: in 1980 a player was transferred to Western club for the first time. The general public learned about it largely after 1990! Some details remain unknown even to the transferred player to this very day. There are issues of historic and statistical nature difficult to clarify as a consequence. Relatively easy part of the long lasting problems is whether this transfer belongs to 1979-80 or to 1980-81 season. It is a common problem, concerning the difference between European seasons: in the North, and USSR, the season was in one year: Spring-Fall. Most of the Europe has Fall-Spring season, covering two years. So, the player was transferred during the 1980 Soviet season, but as far as the receiving country, Austria, is concerned, it was a rather late transfer for the 1980-81 season. Anatoly Zinchenko joined Rapid (Vienna) in October 1980. His contract was for one year, but eventually he played for Rapid until 1983. The secrecy of his transfer was so big, that when Dinamo (Moscow) arrived in Vienna to play and he went to meet the team, Dinamo players simply laughed when he told them he plays for Rapid – they thought it a joke. The general perception in USSR was that Zinchenko retired from football. Unfortunately, the transfer was not just a football matter – it was almost entirely ideological and political, hence, the mystery. A mystery so deep, that when I saw a photo of Rapid and recognized Zinchenko in it, my first thought was that he defected. The whole story is weird.
Who was Anatoly Zinchenko? Almost nobody by 1980. Born in 1949, he started early and was bright, very promising center-forward in the late 1960s. His first season was with Traktor (Volgograd) – he played 2 years for them, 1967-68, and was recruited by stronger club – SKA (Rostov). He played for SKA from 1968 to 1971.
Dangerous young striker: Zinchenko, on the right, playing his last season for SKA (Rostov) in 1971. After the end of the season, he moved to Zenit (Leningrad). A step up – Zenit was not much at the time, but on one hand SKA was an Army club and unless one wanted to join permanently, the time playing for such a club was limited to the obligatory military service. Those were lean years for SKA too – they finished 14th, barely escaping relegation in 1971, and better players were willing to move to stronger clubs. Zenit was much preferable option and Zinchenko was happy, because he quickly found wonderful partner – the left-winger Khromchenkov. The pair enjoyed excellent 1972 season and both were voted among the 33-best players of the season at the end. Perhaps this was the finest season of Zinchenko, evidently rising and still only 23-years old. He already debuted for the national team and looked like he will be a big star soon. 1973 certainly suggested so, but there was also a dark side: a new coach arrived in 1973. German Zonin, who made Zarya (Voroshilovgrad) champions in 1972, took the reigns of Zenit in 1973.
Zenit 1973 – everything looks great: German Zonin (2nd from rigth), would certainly elevate this team up. With Zinchenko’s help, of course – he is standing right of the middle, 7th from left or right, it does not matter, as becoming for a center-forward. But it was not so great – eventually, Zonin and Zinchenko clashed. As often is the case, the player was unhappy with disciplinarian coach and the coach – with lazy or unruly player. Instead of becoming a big star, Zinchenko faded and by 1975 his relations with Zonin were so strained, he decided to leave Zenit. But by 1975 he was no longer a hot player… and he moved to Dinamo (Leningrad), the smaller club of the city, which immediately took Zinchenko out of circulation: Dinamo struggled in 3rd and 2nd division. It was a club where old players went to have some easy last year or two. Suddenly, Zinchenko was a veteran… he disappeared from sight. However, Yury Morozov became Zenit’s coach in 1979 and he remembered Zinchenko and brought him back to Zenit. He was listed in the team at the beginning of 1980 season, but playing in the lower divisions already took its tall: he never came even close to his ancient form and rarely played. By 1980 few remembered him, he was not interesting news for years already, and Zinchenko decided to retire – he was 31, but, even in his own eyes, finished for the game.
His obscurity was also due to his few games for the national team – only 3 times he played for USSR, scoring one goal. He debuted in 1967 against Yugoslavia and scored his only goal for the national team. Then a long pause followed – he played his second match in 1973 against Bulgaria and soon his 3rd – against Brazil.
Zinchenko with a fierce header against Brazil. Looks fine… on paper. USSR lost both matches in which Zinchenko played – 0-1 to Bulgaria and 0-1 to Brazil. This match, played in Moscow on June 21st, 1973 was his last for the national team. And his career went downhill after that, so this game may be the highest point of his career – 7 years later, he was a nobody. No wonder his absence went unnoticed.
Meantime, Rapid (Vienna) sold Hans Krankl to Barcelona and badly needed a good replacement. It became a Communist Party matter… Rapid had traditionally very close ties with Austrian Left: it was founded as a ‘workers club’ after all. The Austrian Communist Party had close relations with the Soviet Communist Party. The chief-editor of the ACP newspaper decided to get a Soviet player and was instrumental for the transfer. Negotiations started in March 1980. Zinchenko was informed by his coach Yury Morozov, so he postponed his retirement until the matter was settled. It was not something believable, the issue moved slowly from Party levels to the Soviet sport committee, to the difficulty who and how to handle transfer with Western club. Permission to transfer a player to the West was one thing, who to transfer – another. The Austrians wanted Blokhin. They wanted Konkov. They wanted Kolotov. For the Soviets, such players were out of the question. A veteran of Ararat (Erevan) was considered – Kovalenko – which is a hint of the nature of Soviet considerations. The Austrians wanted experienced player with a name. This was perhaps the common ground: the Soviets were willing to consider only experienced players: ‘mature’ men, near the end of their careers, already settled down, so be trusted they would not defect and embarrass USSR. That was the common practice in every East European country, for the same reasons: players no longer needed for the national team and old enough to have families and other strong attachments to the ‘motherland’. Fame was difficult issue: a famous player would be noted by the fans. Blokhin, Kolotov, and Konkov were out of the question – Kovalenko and Zinchenko were in. On one hand, they could have passed for ‘famous’ players – by old reputation. On the other hand, nobody remembered them anymore to pay attention their sudden absence. Zinchenko was the best, because he practically disappeared from sight in 1976. Three other things worked in his favour: Soviet sportsmen’s ‘moral character’ was scrutinized, especially of those playing for the national teams, thus, going abroad – Zinchenko had favourable report: not involved with ‘criminal structures’. The second was connections: Zinchenko knew and was on good terms with bureaucrats of sports governing bodies. His coach, Yury Morozov, was also on good terms with such people and put a word here and there. The third was of general nature: players, belonging to Army and Police clubs – that is, whoever played for all clubs named Dinamo and SKA – were officially officers and automatically unfit for transfer abroad. This explains part of the reasons Blokhin and Konkov, Dinamo Kiev players, were out of the question and also explains why Dinamo Moscow laughed when Zinchenko met them in Vienna and told them he was playing for Rapid – they could not imagine such thing. All reasons eventually belong to ideological politics, boiling down to the problem Soviets were facing: the transfer had to be kept out of public knowledge, for ‘Soviet sport’ was superior to ‘degrading’ professional sport. And along with that, if a football player could work in the West, why not other sportsmen, and by extension, why not everybody? Domestic reasons, but not only: Austrian Communist Party and Rapid were friendly entities, but still at the other side of the Iron curtain – why helping the ‘enemy’ with strong player? Sooner or later, they may play against ‘us’ – and benefit at ‘our’ expense and from ‘our’ generosity. Better give them somebody not so good – an almost retired player was just perfect.
But this brings the question why Austria was the first permitted destination – foreign clubs were interested obtaining Soviet players for years and surely Spanish or West German club would pay more than Austrian one. Now a hint comes from another sport: USSR exported hockey players since the early 1970s. The first country was Austria, followed by Finland and Japan. Part of the reason was political – nobody paid attention to the post-Second World War peace treaties for years, but USSR had special ones with both Austria and Finland, which made it easy to put pressure and prevent possible defection. Austria was safer from Soviet perspective than other Western countries, so they exported old hockey players there and the formula was established: no Dinamo or CSKA player ever went abroad, but Spartak Moscow players did. The International Hockey Federation’s rules helped the Soviets in their own efforts to hide professional contracts: since under those rules every European player was mere amateur, USSR did not export professional players, but, officially, coaches. Who, once in Austria, transformed into playing coaches – and played. Nobody defected, which was a good sign for risking a football player. It was not possible to make Zinchenko ‘a coach’, but another way was found – Zinchenko not only never signed the contract with the Austrians – he never even saw it! The terms remain unknown to him to this very day. It was never made public. It was not a contract between clubs – Zenit was not involved, not even the Soviet Football Federation was directly involved: it was a contract bargained and signed by entirely different organization and Zinchenko went to Vienna as ‘engineer’ employed by ‘Soyuzvneshtechnika’, a body dealing with specialists permitted to work abroad. Zinchenko was paid by this organization, receiving his salary – in special vouchers Soviets had for such workers, giving him the right to shop in the special Soviet stores using hard currency – in the Soviet Embassy in Vienna. At the end, Zinchenko lost most of his payment – his salary was paid in special vouchers, exchangeable for goods in those hard currency stores, so, he was unable to spend them in Austria, and had little use for them back in Leningrad. He kept those vouchers at home for years and when USSR collapsed found himself with pile of useless paper. Anyhow, Zinchenko went to Vienna not as a football player, but as some kind of engineer. The news was not mentioned in any big publication, so it remained unknown and stayed so until the end of USSR, when players already were moving abroad and purely historic question emerged who was the first one. Then at last Zinchenko’s story was published.
So big and dark was the iron curtain, that Zinchenko was not even quite sure where was he going to play. Nothing was simple – for some mysterious reason his plane ticket was difficult ‘to make’. At last he was informed by a brief telegram: ‘Your flight to Vienna is scheduled at…’. According to Zinchenko, he believed that all this is real only when he got the telegram. His Zenit’s teammate Kazachenok told him that Rapid is like Dinamo Moscow, ‘a club never winning anything’, which gave the impression to Zinchenko that he was joining some small insignificant club. In Vienna he arrived late – at the end of October. Half an year passed and not exactly in negotiations of contract terms. Rapid received his new player at last, Zinchenko, not knowing a word of German, was shaken when he was introduced to the team and the fans – it was too lavish for ‘a small club’ he thought he went to. He was received well and also helped with money: his Croatian coach, Otto Baric, knew very well the weird terms of the contract and passed personally to Zinchenko the playing bonuses. The Soviet negotiators were not aware of such practice – the bonuses were the more important part of the earnings of players than their fixed salaries – and the contract said nothing of them. Unfortunately, bonuses were also public knowledge and regularly published in the Austrian press, so the Embassy learned about them and Zinchenko had to lie constantly that he got no money, but material bonuses: furniture, clothes , appliances. Baric warned him to keep these payments secret and to a point, those were the money Zinchenko lived from in Austria – his ‘official’ salary in vouchers was leaving him penniless in fact. He trained well, played well, became an important regular of the team, and stayed 3 years with Rapid instead of the original one.
But the question who was the first Soviet player to play abroad remains. Zinchenko was not really the very first. A few Soviet players played in East German Second Division in 1979-80. May be some appeared earlier. Some played in Israel perhaps since the 1960s, when Jews were permitted to emigrate. Vassilis Hadzipanagis went to Greece in 1975. Then Armenian player appeared in USA – and returned back to Ararat (Erevan). Perhaps, the correct term would be that Zinchenko was the first Soviet player officially permitted to go abroad as a player. The previous cases were in a different category: ‘repatriation’. The Jewish players were mostly kids, going to Israel and USA with their parents. There was no even faintly known player among them. Hadzipanagis, although born in USSR, was the son of Greek political emigrants and did not have Soviet citizenship until called to play for the Junior national team – but he also played for the Soviet Olympic and A national team. Officially, he was permitted to ‘repatriate’, although it was known not only that he was going to play, but also the club which signed him and more than likely paid to some Soviet authority. Avetis Ovsepyan was not even in born in USSR, but in Tehran, Iran – his family emigrated first to USSR, but in the mid-1970s got permission to move to USA. Although in smaller numbers, Armenians were permitted occasionally to ‘repatriate’ similarly to the Jews. Football was not even an issue, but once in USA, Ovsepyan decided to make a living as a professional player, failed, and went back to USSR. And had to participate to the farce prescribed for returning traitors: to tell horrors of the cruel life in capitalist society, to confess his ‘mistakes’ with tears in his eyes, and to beg all Soviet people for forgiveness and to be permitted to join them, repentant, yet, stained by his ultimately unforgivable sin. Ovsepyan was permitted to play and although his career was going steadily downhill, he was still Ararat player in 1980. Those, who played in DDR were entirely different case: they were officers and soldiers, stationed in DDR. The better known names were veterans well over 30 and not interesting as players anymore to the Soviet clubs. It was purely military assignment having nothing to do with football. Once in DDR, some kind of almost benevolent deal was made locally: players were allowed to play for the local club, because there was no other; local authorities, knowing the reputation of some of the players, perhaps asked the local Soviet Army commander to give the a bit of help; may be some money were moved quietly from one pocket to another, but it was a matter entirely outside the Soviet football authorities: it was between the Army and local German officials, no special permits were needed, for nobody was going anywhere – the players still belonged to the Army and could be moved elsewhere, if the Army ordered them so. Strictly speaking, none of the Soviet footballers playing abroad before Zinchenko went abroad explicitly to play. But strictly speaking, Zinchenko was not permitted to go to Vienna as a player either – he was merely a ‘Soviet specialist’ allowed to work (help) abroad as an ‘engineer’, employed by Soviet organization and receiving Soviet salary, not paid directly from Rapid. He had no contract with Rapid , like those playing in DDR, and unlike Ovsepyan and Hadzipanagis. Apart from ideological and political concerns, the Soviets had no legal mechanism for such occasions and transfers of players was slow, painful, extremely puzzling and bureaucratic process until the collapse of USSR. Zinchenko was kept on tip-toes for half and year, not even believing the transfer real. Seemingly, even getting a ticket for a flight to Vienna was difficult issue, dragged in secrecy as long as possible. No wonder Zinchenko was almost shell-shocked at his arrival at his new club.
If we discard those playing in DDR, Zinchenko could be considered the first Soviet player transferred to the West only by ethnicity: not Greek, Armenian, or Jewish. This is crazy argument and never voiced out, but what else is left to support the claim? Statistics? Rapid was the last club Zinchenko played for – and so is Iraklis (Saloniki) for Hadzipanagis. Whatever statistics exist for Ovsepyan omit the US club he briefly played for. Mikhail Forkash, who played in DDR from 1977 to 1982, has his German club added to his biography occasionally and only recently (with a question mark for the number of games he played – they remain unknown so far). Marian Plakhetko, who played in East Germany from 1976 to 1980 has East German club and number of matches for it added only recently. Neither Forkash (1 match for USSR), nor Plakhetko (2 matches) was big national team star – but then neither Zinchenko, nor Hadzipanagis have better records. However, today Forkash and Plakhetko appear as Ukrainians… and Zinchenko is? Russian? According to birthplace, judged by today’s political geography? Going picky, ‘Zinchenko’ is not purely Russian name. Was he the first Soviet player to appear for foreign club? Well, it took more than 10 years for journalists and football historians in USSR/Russia to find out he played abroad and even longer ‘to discover’ Forkash and Plakhetko. By the time of ‘discovery’, foreign transfers were nothing new, so the general public was hardly impressed. One things is sure, though: there was gap of few years before another Soviet player was transferred to a Western club and the second transfer was no longer kept in secret, but was instant news.
There is one more aspect to Zinchenko’s transfer – the year. In 1980 other Eastern bloc countries carefully started the export of players. Czechoslovakia (for the first time after a brief period related to the ‘Prague Spring’ in the late 1960s), Romania (exporting players in the 1960s, but stopped in the beginning of the 1970s), Bulgaria (for the first time ever – the few players, who went abroad in the 1940s, officially moved to study, but the Communist rule had not yet entirely stifled the country – no player went abroad after 1946, except a single defector). It is unlikely that export was orchestrated – more likely Eastern European football officials were just watching the ‘mood’ in USSR, and seeing it not severely prohibitive, made their moves. But the pattern was the same everywhere: old, nearing retirement players, but very famous, preferably from smaller provincial clubs. One player at first, as an ‘exception’, then a pause, then eventually a second ‘exception’, then making official – but not publicized very much – rule, stipulating who would be suitable: players over 28 years of age. The Football Federation was the body dealing with foreign transfers – the clubs and the players were not a party. ‘Friendly’ countries were the first destinations: Austria, Cyprus, Greece, Portugal, France. So many similarities to be mere co-incident. It took years until Eastern European started making more meaningful – in terms of money and playing careers – transfers: big clubs, asking for current stars continued to be refused. To a point, it looked like the Soviets gave a tiny signal that it is no longer forbidden to export players and get some hard cash for them, the satellites jumped eagerly on the opportunity, and the Soviets set back to watch what could happen, until making their mind at last – and falling behind all others in the process, except DDR (and not counting Albania, for it was not in the Soviet camp). If Soviets gave a signal, even without having that in mind, they were so slow, that when Zinchenko arrived in Vienna, there were already Eastern European players, whose federations started negotiations after USSR, but completed them much quicker. Thus, Zinchenko had Antonin Panenka as team-mate in Rapid, and had to play against the Bulgarian striker Petko Petkov, who joined Austria (Vienna).
Anatoly Zinchenko in Rapid shirt at last. It did not look like a great deal… getting almost retired player, but Rapid gambled not only with him: the Czechoslovaks agreed to transfer Panenka only as a package – the 38-years old Frantisek Vesely was the other part. Either both, or no Panenka. Yet, the gamble worked – Zinchenko settled well. His original contract of one year was extended and played 3 seasons. When Hans Krankl returned to Rapid, he was more than pleased having Zinchenko as a team-mate and urged the club to keep him. Contrary to expectations, Zinchenko was a success in Austria. Unfortunately, he arrived too old… three years later he was too old for a new extension. Perhaps if Otto Baric was still coaching Rapid in 1983, Zinchenko would have been kept a bit longer – but Baric was gone and the new coach had different ideas. Zinchenko returned to Leningrad, where nobody believed that he was absent from the city because he played 3 years for Rapid. But all that was still in the unknown future – in 1980 the long saga of the first Soviet transfer of a player to Western club dragged on until its risky completion. As for Soviet fears of ‘defection’ and ‘betrayal of motherland’… technically, they had justifiable reasons to be cautious: Otto Baric offered coaching position to Zinchenko, a simple thing for the Croatian, who did not care much what the Soviets would think – if they do not give permission, so what? Stay anyway, the job is yours. Zinchenko refused, because he was very nostalgic for Leningrad – according to him, nostalgia was almost unbearable and the most difficult aspect of life to deal with in Vienna.
What of Zinchenko, as a person jumping into the unknown, then? Given the circumstances, failure not just on the pitch, was more than likely. The culture shock was too big – according to him, he was ‘just an ordinary Soviet person of his time’. Ignorant of life in ‘capitalist society’, perhaps even fearful. But Zinchenko says to this very day that he adapted well, felt no hostility, was pleasantly surprised that politics did not appear in the dressing room and his team-mates were more than friendly. He learned German, befriended local people, enjoyed Vienna, had no problems with the club – he maintains fond memories of his stay in every aspect of life. He quickly returned to his long gone great from and had a revival, as if it was 1972 again. Obviously, a good professional, perhaps lucky, to find himself in the right club and with right team-mates and coach. Compared to a big deal of the next Soviet exports, Zinchenko’s is a success story – Blokhin was way too old to make impression, when finally transferred to Austrian club; others were not transferred to suitable club for one or another reason; some failed to adapt to professional demands and Western lifestyle; and some were cheated by either careless contracts or dishonest clubs. And there were injuries after all. Zinchenko had no such problems and remains as a truly success story (apart from the Soviet aspects of it and his post-Vienna financial misfortunes, entirely related to the way he was paid by his ‘official’ Soviet employer). Speculatively, perhaps the only mistake he made was refusing Baric’s offer to become his assistant – Zinchenko’s coaching career was far from good in USSR, coming close a failure. But this has nothing to do with his years playing for Rapid.