MOSCOW, November 22. Former CSKA and Russian national team football player Alan Dzagoev admitted that in childhood they could have rewritten his age, but the current coach of the Samara “Wings of the Soviets” Igor Osinkin dissuaded his father from this idea.
Born in June 1990, Dzagoev announced his retirement on Tuesday at the age of 33.
“»This has been going on with me since childhood, because I always played with older kids. At the age of 13-14 they already came to my school, checked magazines, looked up archives. They offered to my father to sign me up for a year. I, quite possibly , could have been 1991. Now in Ossetia it has become calmer about what needs to be rewritten, because everyone has been rewritten,” Dzagoev said on the YouTube channel of journalist Nobel Arustamyan.
Osinkin noticed Dzagoev at the Leather Ball tournament, after which the young man was invited to the Tolyatti Football Academy in 2005.
““Dad didn’t refuse, Osinkin dissuaded me. He said that I wouldn’t be able to look me in the eye anymore when they asked me about my age. Now I can look me straight in the eye and say that I’m my age,” the player added.
Dzagoev played for CSKA from 2008 to 2022, played 397 matches, scored 77 goals and made 93 assists. As part of the army team, the midfielder became a three-time champion of Russia, and also won four Russian Cups and three national Super Cups. Dzagoev has played for the Russian national team since 2008, played 59 matches with it, scoring nine goals.