- Oh, can I have a pass so that I can leave Luzhniki’s territory by car? - so Ekaterina Gamova ran into the Universal Friendship “Druzhba”, where the press conference of the world champions was to begin.
“For you, Katya, anything,” the representatives of the Federation shook their hands.
“But I need it now,” Katya whispered in fear. And she immediately handed a piece of paper.
“Katya, Lena, Lyuba,” Valentin Zhukov, the first vice president of the federation, was delighted to see Gamova, Godina and Sokolova. “We rarely see you.” Journalists - more often.
The girls were embarrassed and furtively glanced at the reporters. Those gathered a lot.
- Katya, did you even sleep after returning from Japan? someone called to Gamow.
- Nope, - Catherine smiled and went to her friends.
Sokolova just demonstrated what she came in: jeans, a blouse.
“I have absolutely nothing to wear,” she flirted. Girlfriends burst out again. They had an excellent mood.
Volleyball players, although they looked tired, but their attention did not tire at all. They joyfully and probably already for the thousandth time experienced the moment of victory.
“We lost the first game to the Brazilians,” Gamova said laughing. - And suddenly I see that the president of our federation Nikolay Parushev is leaving the rostrum. Well, I think even our president does not believe in us. But he, it turns out, moved from an unlucky place. Moved to where the semifinals from the Italians watched.
“Well, do you look at the stands during the game ?!” - Someone was amazed.
- But what about! Gamow exclaimed fervently.
“To be honest, even when we lost to the Brazilians in the group stage, we were not too upset,” said Lyubov Sokolova. - They knew that we could improve the game. They believed in themselves. And they reached the final calm, although tuned.
They asked if they could see Japan. For example, go shopping.
“Girls have shopping every day,” Giovanni Caprara grumbled jokingly in pure Russian. - In the morning - shopping, in the evening - shopping. They have it instead of training.
When the trainer was asked to tell what mood the team had after the defeat in the group of Brazilians, he was ready to answer as he was knocked down by Godina’s whisper:
- Elated.
Gamova and Sokolova burst into laughter again.
“Probably you had an easy championship in general,” concluded one of the journalists, impressed by such fun.
- Why do you think so? - Gamow has become absolutely serious. - Maybe it seemed so from the outside. But we can only call two matches easy. And in the rest I had to fight with all my might. Give all your best ...
There was so much steel in the captain’s voice that everyone immediately understood why and how exactly the Russian team won this championship.
Alexey Shevchenko