ZCZC
BSP-15
FOOTBALL-WC-SPAIN
Spain football national team feel great in Russia, says Hierro
MOSCOW, July 1. /TASS/. The Spain national squad are feeling wonderful in Russia ahead of a knockout stage match against 2018 World Cup hosts Russia and the Spanish footballers are not scared to play at Moscow’s Luzhniki stadium, Fernando Hierro, the Spain head coach, told reporters on Saturday.
Team Russia will take on Spain at the Luzhniki stadium in Moscow on Sunday at 17.00 Moscow Time.
“There is no doubt that your country has done great preparatory work and I noticed that three years ago. My guys are used to playing at big stadiums where fans do not root for our team. So the pitch will settle it all,” Hierro said.
Russia is staging its first-ever FIFA World Cup, which kicked off in Moscow with a spectacular opening show at the Luzhniki Stadium on the night of June 14.
The country selected 11 host cities to be the venues for the matches of the 2018 World Cup and they are Moscow, St. Petersburg, Sochi, Kazan, Saransk, Kaliningrad, Volgograd, Rostov-on-Don, Nizhny Novgorod, Yekaterinburg and Samara.
A total of 32 national football teams entered the 2018 FIFA World Cup and only 16 of them proceeded to the knockout phase after the group stage, which kicked off on June 14 and ended on June 28.
According to FIFA’s official statistics, the total number of fans at all stadiums during 48 matches of the group stage came to 2,178,894 people, which carries an average of 45,394 at each match. The 48 already played matches out of all scheduled 64 games at this World Cup saw 122 scored goals (2.54 per match on the average), with the national team of Belgium scoring the most in its three group stage matches (nine goals).
BSS/TASS/SMM/1555 hrs