The Death Match

OTD E0282 — 09 Aug 1942: In Nazi-occupied Kyiv, FC Start beat Flakelf 5–3 in the match remembered as the Death Match. This episode tells the story carefully: Operation Barbarossa, the fall of Kyiv, Babyn Yar, the bakery team built around former Dynamo and Lokomotiv players, Mykola Trusevych, Makar Honcharenko, Josef Kordik, Rukh, the exhibition matches of 1942, the August 6 win over Flakelf, the August 9 rematch, the contested myths around threats and salutes, the later arrests, Syrets, the murder of Trusevych, Kuzmenko and Klymenko, Soviet myth-making, Escape to Victory, and why the story still has to be remembered.Ideas: [email protected]