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"Shakhtar" didn't manage to take revenge
After winning the crystal Cup 4 days later "Ararat" had to face "Shakhtar" Donetsk in the 27th tour of the championship. Unlike "Ararat" "Shakhtar" had a week to prepare for this important match. So "Ararat" left for Donetsk from Moscow taking with them the crystal Cup. However, before arriving to Yerevan the Cup first went to Ukraine, but as a prize rewarded to "Ararat". "Ararat" management recognizing the seriousness of the match during the meeting next day asked footballers for some while to forget about the historic victory and concentrate only on the coming match. As the result of the match against "Shakhtar" was significant in the battle for the USSR championship's gold medals. It was quite obvious that "Shakhtar" which was the second team in Ukraine would try to take revenge for "Dinamo's" defeat in the USSR Cup final. The whole Ukraine was eager of the revenge, so the interest towards the match was enormous. The stadium in Donetsk was full of spectators. In comparison with the Cup final "Ararat's" squad had some changes. Because of different matters in "Ararat's" line up were absent Kovalenko, Zanazanyan and Margarov (the latter entered the pitch in the second half). Instead from the first minutes of the match in the pitch were present Khazaryan and Poghosyan who entering the pitch in the Cup final with their selfless play helped their time to achieve success. Forseeing that "Shakhtar" would play in attacking manner "Ararat" first of all paid attention to the defence. For that purpose the 5th defender Suren Martirosyan was also included in the squad. "Ararat's" intention that day was quite obvious, to play only on counter-attacks and try to surprise the opponent. "Shakhtar" was unable to pass "Ararat's" faultless defence. A great work was done by "Ararat" midfielders, who were taking the work of the back in case of necessity. "Shakhtar" was active in the right wing where worth mentioning the active play from Dudinski. Though "Ararat" in that match made only 5 shots, but all of them were quite dangerous. 3 of them were realized by Andreasyan. So the match ended in goalless draw. Once again "Ararat" had to try his luck on penalty shoot-out. This was "Ararat's" 4th draw in the 2nd circle. In previous 3 cases "Ararat" was unlucky during penalty shoot-outs. The lose of 1 point in Donetsk could become fatal for ''Ararat''. Fortunatelly, this time Armenian team players were sharp, realizing 4 of the 5 shots. Abrahamyan was perfect that day denying the strike by Zvyaginsyev which was actually the turning point. However, the point taken from ''Shakhtar'' was an important one for keeping the leading position in the championship list.
Unlike ''Ararat'', ''Dinamo'' Kiev after the Cup final had to face on home ground the weeping boys of ''Zenith''. In that match ''Dinamo'' Kiev entered the pitch under the leadership of prominent Valery Lobanovski. Under his leadership the main club of Ukraine defeated ''Zenith'' with the score 2:0 and equaled on points with ''Ararat''. So, everything had to be decided in the final 3 tours.
Yerevan welcomes its heroes
After one week trip to Moscow and Donetsk, on October 15 ''Ararat''players and management returned to Yerevan. Thousands of fans were gathered in the ''Zvartnots'' airport to give warm reception to their idols. The management of the airport had kept in secret the exact hour and flight number of plane's arrival in order to avoid the enthusiastic crowd. However, the fans heard the information from somewhere and were present in the airport. When the pane landed, the first person to appear in front of the happy crowd was the team's captain Hovhannes Zanazanyan who kept the Cup in his hands.By the way Zanazanyan had been invited to participate for the USSR team in friendly against German Democratic Republic in Moscow. But ''Ararat'' captain couldn't miss the opportunity to be present at the warm reception in native Yerevan. Later it turned out that Nikita Simonyan had asked the USSR head coach Evgeni Goryanski to let Zanazanyan leave for Yerevan and share the national festivity with his team-mates. Few hours later Zanazanyan left for Moscow. Before that ''Ararat'' players were taken on the shoulders of enthusiastic fans. Everybody was happy, people were congratulating one another. Next day ''Ararat'' visited the National Academy of Sciences of Armenia. Once again the footballers received congratulations and wishes …… ''Ararat'' players were welcomed by the president of Academy Victor Hambardzumyan. Those were really emotive meetings. However, the festive atmosphere didn't last too long as ''Ararat'' had 3 decisive matches of the championship, for which Nikita Simonyan's alumni had to prepare seriously. On October 20 in ''Hrazdan'' stadium ''Ararat'' had to face one of the outsiders of the championship ''Dinamo'' Minsk, then 4 days later they were to meet with CSKA in Moscow and on October 28 in Yerevan, in the final match of the championship ''Ararat'' had to battle with ''Zenith'' from Leningrad. In fact ''Ararat'' was in a very promising situation, as 2 matches were to be held in Yerevan, whereas, ''Dinamo'' Kiev had to battle the remaining matches away: in Lviv, in Alma-Ata and in Tashkent.
27th Tour
''Shakhtar'' - ''Ararat'' 0:0, 3:4 11m. penalties
October 14th, Donetsk ''Shakhtar'' stadium 45 000 spectators
Referee: V. Lipatov (Moscow)
''Shakhtar'' - Degtyaryov-5, Yaremchenko-5, Zvyagintsev-5, Belousov-5, Gorbunov-3, Vankevich-3, Vasin-4, Konkov-5, Starukhin-4, Dudinski-4, Safonov-4
''Ararat'' - Abrahamyan-5, Gevorgyan-5, Sargsyan-5, A. Harutyunyan-5, Mesropyan-5, Andreasyan-5, Bondarenko-5, Ishtoyan-5, Poghosyan-5, Martirosyan-5, Khazaryan-5, (Margarov 72-5):
11m. penalty shots were realized by Konkov, Ishtoyan, Starukhin, Andreasyan, Poghosyan, Vasin and Margarov:
11m. penalty shots failed to score Zvyagintsev (denied by Abrahamyam), Yeremchenko, Sargsyan:
Substitutes: 2:0
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