Evaluation of the top division was subdued and a bit puzzled. It was not possible to be optimistic first of all because the national team, going down during the whole decade, reached the lowest possible point – it was eliminated again. This time there was no excuse – no more political protests, like in 1974, no more biased referees, like in 1976 and 1978. This time it was clear inability of team USSR to prevail over weaker opponents, some of which – Hungary and Greece – were obstacle not long ago too. The ‘crown’ performance was a 2-2 tie against Finland. At home… The result did not matter by the time, but still it a disgrace. On the other hand USSR twice excelled in the world junior championships – in 1977 and 1979: young generation was coming, and it was very promising, but it was too young to make any impact on the league and the national team. Meantime general change of generations was taking place, which left most clubs with very insignificant squads. The problem was perhaps aggravated by the enlargement of the league – there were simply not enough players around. Some clubs were declining for years, but now even those usually having no trouble making decent squads suffered. Yet, the newest change of rules, limiting ties to 8 games, and clubs not getting points for any tie above the limit, was seen as working. Slowly, but working. Increase of goal-scoring was noticed. Better physical condition of the teams was noticed. Four clubs competed for the title, which was also promising – usually, it was a two-team race at best. For a first time since 1970 an individual scored more than 20 goals during the season. Yet, the season was darkened by a tragedy, which was toned down, but it was not possible to keep out of public eye, as the Soviets traditionally preferred. It could be said that Soviet football was in a tradition, reaching its lowest point because of that – so, pessimism was not overwhelming, but there was little to be cheerful about and really promising better future. Little was said as a result.
As for the tragedy, it was of a kind ‘never possible’ in a communist country. An air crush killed the whole team of Pakhtakor (Tashkent) in the middle of the season. The catastrophe had to be made public… it was not possible to explain otherwise why a whole club suddenly disappeared from the championship. As little as possible was said, but it was said… On August 11, 1979 Pakhtakor team going to play championship match in Minsk. They traveled on regular Tashkent-Donetzk-Minsk flight. Above the city of Dneprodzerzhinsk their plane collided in the air with the regular flight servicing the Chelyabinsk-Voronezh-Kishinev line. A total of 178 people died – 165 passengers and 13 crew members. Among them – 14 players, assistant coach, the team doctor, and the administrator of Pakhtakor. At first nothing was said… the regular issue of the weekly ‘Football-Hockey’ came out on August 12 and there was no word. But it was not possible to keep the news under the lid: it was mid-season and in the same issue the current table was published: Pakhtakor were 8th after 18 games. They had strong season going on. Apart from attention focused on them because of their performance, Pakhtakor had two high-profile stars – Mikhail Ahn and Vladimir Fedorov, both on and off the national team. There was no way to avoid the news, for sudden disappearance of whole good playing squad in mid-season would only focus attention on Pakhtakor. But, by Soviet logic, there was no convenient way to convey bad news – priorities were entirely different: the paper’s issue from August 12 had its big news – the end of the Spartakiad. Pages were dedicated to the glorious event, and the first page pictured the winners:
It was Team Moscow, followe by Team Georgia, and Team Ukraine was third. Even without terrible news, the front page was not really great news: it rather confirmed what everybody knew for some time – as far as football was concerned, this tournament was inconvenient interruption of the regular championship, not to be taken very seriously, if teams, including the national teams, wanted to keep their players healthy and focused. Technically, Ukraine appeared to be the strongest by far – it was largely the national team (12 players of Dinamo Kiev, all regulars, including Blokhin) plus the 4 key players of Shakhter Donetzk. The rest consisted of from Chernomoretz Odessa and Karpaty Lvov. The new sensation Stepan Yurchishin was included, of course.
Team Georgia was largely Dinamo Tbilisi and Team Moscow was weird mix – the core consisted of young players of Spartak. The rest belonged to Dinamo Moscow and mostly for ‘colour’ the odd payer from Lokomotiv, CSKA and Torpedo completed the squad. There were current stars, but also players over the hill and rather suspect low key players. The team seemingly was based on promising talent, not on the stars. Two players dropped out during the tournament due to sickness and injury. This team not only looked weaker than than Ukraine and Georgia, but also was the only one really needing some training and shaping – the opposition had the advantage of simply fielding well oiled Dinamo Kiev and Dinamo Tbilisi regular squads under different name. But this was also the great rick of losing regulars injured during irritating mid-season tournament. Who played at earnest and who just went through the motions was not an issue of debate – the Spartakiad had to be only praised. And so it… anything else, either criticism, or other news was unthinkable.
The news about the death of whole team appeared on August 19. Even in ‘normal’ time it was to be minimized, but this was not ‘normal’ time… the Spartakiad just ended and the USSR Cup final was played… Half the newspaper was dedicated to the final and the winners. Then and interview running on three pages with the Canadian hockey superstar Bobby Orr followed… A tiny note on the funeral of the team on August 17 appeared on the vary last page of ‘Football-Hockey’:
It was half the size of the material published just next: about some obscure football competition between school teams. On August 26 the decision of the USSR Football Federation finally appeared in print – once again, it was short note on the very last page of ‘Football-Hockey’, titled ‘Pakhtakor will not left without help’. Two matches were postponed – with Dinamo Minsk, originally scheduled for August 12, and against Kairat Alma-Ata, originally scheduled for August 18. The transfer regulations were waived and Pakhtakor was permitted an exception for the current season and the next year. Another exception was made – Pakhtakor was not to be relegated, regardless where they were at the final table, for the next three years. ‘Practical help’ was urged and seemingly already started: all other clubs were asked to send players to Tashkent and some already did so. The language was murky… it sounded that clubs were ordered to help, yet, on voluntary base. This ‘voluntary obligation’, neither here, nor there, brought strange results: a total of 17 players went to Tashkent – 12 in August, 4 in September, and 1 in October. Six of them arrived from Third Division, 3 – from Second Division, and 8 from First Division. The first division players were generally the last to arrive. Seemingly, they came temporary – until the end of the season, ‘loaned’ rather than really given to Pakhtakor. Practically all first division players were deep reserves in their original teams. From the leading clubs only Spartak and Dinamo Moscow gave players. Tellingly, Dinamo Kiev sent none… Oleg Bazilevich, who was in tandem with Lobanovsky when Dinamo Kiev won the Cup Winners Cup and the European Supercup in 1975, was now coaching Pakhtakor – and he got no help from his former club and his ‘friend’ Lobanovsky. At he end only one player with big name went to play for Pakhtakor – Andrey Yakubik from Dinamo Moscow. Back in 1972, he got bronze medal from the Olympic games as part of the Soviet Olympic team. By now he was considered over the hill and not really needed by Dinamo Moscow. He was 29 years old. So, that was the ‘big help’…
As for the catastrophe, the case ended one year later when two people were sentenced to 15 years in prison. Much later information slowly, by bits and pieces, leaked out, never completely uncovering what really happened and why. Three corridors for air traffic existed in the sky above the city of Novokuznetzk. On August 11 Chernenko was to fly and may be Brezhnev, on a different flight. Time was unknown, so one corridor was closed for all other traffic – reserved for the big shots and their whims. Down, in the control tower it was ‘business as usual”: two dispatchers. The senior one ‘routinely’ ordered the junior dispatcher to handle the air traffic. He did, but there was miscomunication, or carelessness, or incompetentness – the junior dispatcher thought he gave the right orders and they were confirmed. Even with one corridor closed, it seems there was not all that heavy and complicated air traffic, but two TU-134 passenger planes, flying in the opposite directions collided in the air. The court found the two dispatchers equally guilty and gave them severe sentences, but… nobody else from the airport was called to the trial. Not even the shift supervisor in charge. Not even as a witness! Strange, since the court still found that the junior dispatcher was wrongly placed on duty under the circumstances – it was hardly possible the senior dispatcher to be the man giving the orders who deals with traffic, most likely it should have been the job of the shift supervisor. Anyhow, that is what is known now.
As for Pakhtakor, it was disaster and time of grieve. The veteran defender Mogilny was lucky: he was injured and stayed in Tashkent. Mikhail Ahn was unlucky… he was also injured and not playing, but decided to go with the team anyway and died. Oleg Bazilevich was also lucky – he took advantage of the trip West and did not travel with the team, but separately, wanting to visit family on route. Many years later Vasilis Hadzipanagis, one of the young trio bursting into stardom in the early 1970s , went to visit the graves of his friends and wondered what could have been if he did not move to Greece, but stayed in USSR – he was unable to come to conclusion, but considered that he most likely would had been playing for some Moscow club by 1979 and thus avoid the crash. Yet, Hadzipanagis could not make his mind: his friends Ahn and Fedorov had the same options, but stayed with Pakhtakor… but his speculations are clearly academic. The reality was bitter: the team died. Hadzipanagis recalled the old days, when Mikhail Ahn often invited the whole team to visit his parents’ house outside Tashkent and feast on Korean home-made food. Only memories remained after the crash.
Pakhtakor (Tashkent), 1979 at the beginning of the season. At the time of the catastrophe Kochetkov was no longer coaching them, but Oleg Bazilevich. M. Ahn, Yu. Zagumennykh, and S. Bazarov are missing on the photo. First row, from left: V. Fedorov, M. Talibdzhanov-administrator, G. Antonov, T. Isakov, V. Ambartzumyan -assistant coach, K. Bakanov, Sh. Ishbutaev, Yu. Bassov, K. Novikov.
Middle row: O. Burov , V. Chumakov – team doctor, I. Tazetdinov – assistant coach, V. Makarov, A. Kochetkov – coach, A. Mogilny, N. Kulikov, V. Sabirov, P. Agishev, D. Roman.
Top row: A. Dvornikov – masseur, A. Musaev, S. Pokatilov, A. Korchenov, O. Ashirov, A. Yanovsky, A. Ubaydullaev, G. Denisov, V. Churkin.
R. Agishev, M. Ahn, S. Bazarov, K. Bakanov, Yu. Zagumennykh, V. Sabirov, V. Fedorov, V. Churkin, A. Ashirov, M. Ishbutaev, A. Korchenov, N. Kulikov, V. Makarov, S. Pokatilov died in the crash. Also the administrator Talibdzhanov, the assistant coach Tazetdinov, and the team’s doctor Chumakov. The big funeral, staged in Tashkent, apparently aimed of burying the whole team together – may be because of the monument built for the occasion. But it was not so – Yury Zagumennykh was buried in his home city of Leningrad; Mikhail Ahn – in his native place: the Sverdlov Kolkhoz near Tashkent, and N. Kulikov – in his native village of Krivsk, Kaluga District, Russia. Currently, it seems only five bodies actually remain at the official site, but the monument is there.
And another photo commemorating the team:
Soon after the tragedy Dinamo Tbilisi had to visit Pakthakor for the next round of the championship. Pakhtakor won. Years later David Kipiani said that the Georgians talked before the match and decided to let Pakhtakor win – it was their, however small way, of commemorating comrades and helping the club struck by tragedy. Perhaps other clubs acted similarly – Pakhtakor finished 9th this season.
Here is the list of ‘volunteer’ players, who went to Pakhtakor after the disaster: Renat Fayruzov (Avtomobilist Termez, 3rd division, August), Vladimir Karman (Aktyubinetz Aktyubinsk, 3rd division, August), Andrey Yakubik (Dinamo Moscow, 1st division, September), Petr Vasilevsky (Dinamo Minsk, 1st division, September), Sergey Strashnenko (Karpaty Lvov, 2nd division, August), Anatoly Solovyov (Lokomotiv Moscow, 1st division, October), Aleksandr Maltzev (Metalurg Tula, 3rd division, September), Vladimir Enns (Neftyanik Fergana, 3rd division, August), Nuritdin Amriev (Pamir Dushanbe, 2nd division, August), Sergey Bashkirov (Spartak Moscow, 1st division, September), Valery Glushakov (Spartak Moscow, 1st division, August), Zurab Tzereteli (Torpedo Kutaisi, 2nd division, August), Vladimir Nechaev (Chernomoretz Odessa, 1st division, August), Mikhail Bondarev (CSKA Moscow, 1st division, August), Tura Shaymardanov (Yangier, 3rd division, August), Vyacheslav Kim (Yangier, 3rd division, August), Yury Churkin (SKA Rostov, 1st division, August).
And one last photo of the unlucky team before the tragedy – Oleg Bazilevich is the coach here.