Vladimir Fyodorov

Vladimir Fyodorov was born on 5 January 1955 in Tashkent Region and grew up in the youth team of the Sverdlov collective farm. In 1972 he was recommended to the Soviet youth team and the same year debuted for Pakhtakor: coach Vyacheslav Solovyov gave the 17-year-old a first-team place at once, and his first goal was the decisive one.

In 1974, when Pakhtakor had reached the top flight, he was ranked No. 2 among Soviet centre-forwards (No. 3 in 1976). Between 1972 and 1979 he played 108 top-flight games and scored 26 goals. He made his Soviet national team debut in October 1974, aged 18, as a substitute in a European Championship qualifier against Ireland, and in all played 18 games for the senior team and 7 for the Olympic team, scoring once. He won bronze at the 1976 Montreal Olympics, the 1976 European under-23 title and the rank of Master of Sport of International Class (1976).

He was killed on 11 August 1979 with his Pakhtakor teammates in the mid-air collision over Dniprodzerzhynsk, in which 17 members of the club died, and was buried at Cemetery No. 1 in Tashkent. In 2006 he was posthumously awarded the Shuhrat Medal.