Legend tells of a superman in the Soviet ranks. He was not of the army, but was a super soldier on a battlefield of a different kind. Between the sticks, Lev Yashin could shut out the strongest attacks in the world, while he guarded the Soviet Union goal in three World Cups—1958, 1962 and 1966—and led them to their best outing in a World Cup, a fourthplace finish in 1966. A deluge of accolades were conferred on him, including FIFA naming him the keeper of the 20th century in 1998.

Fast forward to November 2017— FIFA once again paid homage to the ‘Black Spider’ by putting him on the official poster of the 2018 World Cup. The vintage-styled illustration has Yashin wearing his iconic cap and allblack gear, leaping for an oversized ball that has the outline of Russia on it. It looks odd at first glance, but the old-fashioned imagery fit the message. For, it is in the land where Yashin drew global attention to his motherland’s capabilities—on the football pitch for a change—that FIFA’s 21st quadrennial juggernaut is heading. The World Cup could be referred to as a juggernaut for a variety of reasons, both positive and negative. To focus on the positives would be to celebrate the tournament for the carnival it is.

And so, 31 teams and more than a million visitors are expected to descend on the 11 Russian cities hosting the World Cup, all of which except one are in European Russia. The 80,000-seater Luzhniki stadium, one of the two venues in Moscow, is all set to stage the grand opening on June 14 as well as the final on July 15.