Chisinau's derby played among cows and bolids, under the eyes of GSP reporters »a Romanian coach, insider for the national team
At the foot of Chisinau, in Suruceni, a village caught between two valleys and as many worlds, football gave sense, for several hours, to a different Saturday. Even though autumn still smells of freshly broken walnuts and smoke of leaf in the gardens, Moldova breathes the agitation of a silent community, which is just waiting for an escape from the social proposed for a day, the one before the elections. In all this unusual decor, UTM Politehnica and fc aurochs they played the derby of the capital from the left of Prut.
The road so far, as if you were accompanying the Lăpușna river to the spill, it is a succession of harassment that shakes the body and patience, but at the end you await a cut land from a rural story: small stand Ligi. He is told, without being upset, “League four of seven MD”, not from the old battery brand, but from the boxes with lights and four rows of fruit. And they passed the customs.
At the stadium gate, it is placed, one by one and not very long before the start whistle, the bolts that shine without disturbing the simplicity of the people in Ialoveni district. The Surucenens see their lives whatever they are, as if the big world were just a rumor.
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That is how it is alive, “youth” lost, 2-3, in the end, in front of the Zimbbr, but Politehnica, host because he has no other “house”, he kept hard, missing the maturity proof. It was played in the 14th super league stage. The “students” remained on 7 out of 8, the first retrograde position, while the rival ranks 3rd.
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It was no Moldovan Day. The Brazilian Charles (52 ') and Sierralenese Samuel Gândi (76') scored for “students”, while the yellow-green pointed through Jonathas (48 '), another on Copacabana, respectively the Belarus Denis Kozlovskiy (71') and Matteo Amoroso (87 '), all of it.
Chisinau derby in the simple life of the village
Suruceni is not a neighborhood of Chisinau, but no broken village. Placed to three hills by the residential neighborhoods of the capital, in an area where the modern blocks are mirrored in the quiet of the plateau, the community does not keep up with the screens of the world -it may not want so much -but that is exactly what the timid nobility render it.
The children of the place, away from the tablets and the running of the city, are still included by the old game of the baby, the ball jumped in the dust, a pond where you come to jump. Sounds to call and belong. On their faces, an untouched purity, a sincerity that has been lost in other parts.
In other words, authenticity is in sight, as an icon forgotten on the wall of an old, simple and clean house. And yet, football is the bridge between the worlds.
The microphone crosses, the voice of the soundman is lost in the hills, beats his palms and laughs, sometimes.
Beyond the fence, a few careless cows, in contrast to the strident shirts of the children from the city, with the emblems of Real Madrid, Liverpool or PSG.
From high, the conductor of the show does not wear a fraction, but a red -leather jacket, and does not stand in front of an orchestra, but next to two chopped buttons, his only instruments.
He presses them almost sacrally, as if they open the gates of a job, and the cos are echoed, multiplying every name spoken, when the phone does not ring in the microphone. Something tells us that he misses the evening of resurrection, his “Main Event” of a soundman, over the year.
The lawn, although short cut, is as a stretched blanket on the bed. The ball jumps unpredictably, the steps become long, while the stops are cumbersome. Only good reason to shout at the cough, to laugh at “central”, which is embarrassing. They are connected by the helmet: “These batgiocura, the goalkeeper does not listen to me!”. The scene is an improvised theater, the moment is tasted. “It's football, me,” says a mustache man, lifting the beer.
The children are at ease at the “Chisinau derby”, played in Suruceni. Everything is play and relaxation, in nature. Photo: Andrei suppl, GSP
Football between pies and bureaucratic details
Beyond the voice of the crowd, from the coaches is the polyphony of languages. Some shout “Davai!”, Others “Close the Pass!”, A Moldovan “mining”, a hybrid of English and local dialect, while the ball is required from the edge through a simple “boy!”.
From the buffet, written with two “f” from an imagined emancipation, smells of steaming pies. Eat and comment on the match with the same intensity. “Take one, that your anger passes!” People bite the same from life, with the same lust.
This is how Moldova looks: a country with heavy arms, which carry too many, but enough to encompass you.
On the lawn, the rivalry is dispersed. It's a duel of young people with mature. Photo: Andrei suppl, GSP
On the field, Politehnica UTM and Zimbru played a match that seems to say more about the country than about the ranking. Politehnica, the former Radu Rebeja Academy, the students' team only by name, missed the participation in Youth League after changing its name, a bureaucratic detail that closed the gates to Europe.
On the other side, Zimbru, the symbol of Chisinau, is far from the past glory, caught in an endless reconstruction.
The Romanian thread. I met Stefan Stoica
At the edge of the stands, but not in the chair, attentive to each phase, stands coach Stefan Stoica (58 years), once the second of Stoichiță at Steaua, “principal” at Craiova University, established for more than ten years in the country-country, without any thought in Romanian football.
The smartphone took the place of the block, nothing escapes them. Notes or search on transfermarkt when it does not break a walnut under the shoe. He is responsible for two representatives.
Romanian coach Stefan Stoica, currently the selection of Moldova U20 and U19. Photo: Andrei suppl, GSP
“I came to watch a few players for U19,” he says briefly.
I had the national U20, but I was too quiet, because we have no competition, so they gave me U19. There is a friendly with Bulgaria, let's see how we introduce ourselves. For 3-4 years we play only with the Netherlands, they slept with my non-sleep. I think society and football go hand in hand there, they are too good Dutch.
– Stefan Stoica, Romanian coach
Between two phases, we ask him about choices. Without wanting, we make him sigh. “It is quiet, but it is peace of division. Moldova is too important now to be left alone. Someone has taken care to divide people.”
And maybe he's right. In the way two supporters are contradicted to an offside is the same “Parliament” fracture. Unlike politics, they all drink the same beer and bite from the same pie.
“Kiss, Moldova, your hand!”
Suruceni is not a random point on the map. It is also the village that gave the world Ion Suruceanu, the light music singer who wore his name and origins far, but who remains a warm memory, proudly told by the locals.
When the referee whistled the end, the village withdrew as simple as it came: each at his household, each in everyday life. Beyond the fence, the cows continued to graze carelessly, while the crosses of the cemetery, lined up on the hill, resumed their nothing, discreet as in all the Saturdays that passed and will pass.
Moldova remains the same. He's the grandmother in the gate. A realm where natural and improvisation, well tied with a wire, holds a rule and plan. A country where shortcomings are obvious, but in which people still know how to share their pie, lift their beers and shout “boy!” with the same warm heart.
And we were convinced: football, no matter how shy, is immortal in his power to unite. Louder than an election campaign, stronger than a vote, either he and decisive. For a few hours, in Suruceni, Moldova was no longer divided.
