{"id":8451,"date":"2018-03-07T00:19:52","date_gmt":"2018-03-07T07:19:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/nigerianews.ca\/?post_type=news&p=8451"},"modified":"2018-03-07T00:31:25","modified_gmt":"2018-03-07T07:31:25","slug":"putin-plays-soccer","status":"publish","type":"news","link":"https:\/\/nigerianews.ca\/news\/putin-plays-soccer\/","title":{"rendered":"100 days to World Cup: Putin plays soccer with FIFA boss others"},"content":{"rendered":"
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President Vladimir Putin played football with Fifa boss Gianni Infantino in the Kremlin on Tuesday as Russia marked 100 days before the start of the World Cup.<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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The footage was released by football\u2019s world governing body in a tweet featuring legends of the beautiful game juggling the ball and doing tricks.<\/p>\n

The clip ended with Putin heading the ball back to Infantino after a heavily edited kickabout set to Rimsky-Korsakov\u2019s Flight of the Bumblebee.<\/p>\n

\u201cSome people just can\u2019t wait for the greatest show on earth,\u201d Fifa said in the tweet.<\/p>\n

Others playing around with the official Telstar 18 World Cup ball included ex-England midfielder Wayne Rooney and Argentina\u2019s Diego Maradona.<\/div>\n

Brazil\u2019s Ronaldo juggled the ball by the beach while Sweden\u2019s Thomas Brolin had his fun in the snow.<\/p>\n

Putin is best known for learning to skate and playing ice hockey with government officials and Russian veterans of the winter sport.<\/p>\n

But the judo black belt is a sports fanatic who is hoping to use the World Cup to showcase Russia and boost its image at a time of frail relations with the West.<\/p>\n

Russia is hosting its first World Cup on June 14-July 15 in 11 host cities stretching from its western exclave of Kaliningrad near Poland to Yekaterinburg in the Urals.<\/p>\n

Numerous Russian cities are planning events to commemorate 100 days before the start of the 32 team tournament.<\/p>\n

Moscow is staging an open air concert for 6,000 volunteers while Russia\u2019s northern capital Saint Petersburg is unveiling a countdown clock.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is important to show Russia the way it really is: open, hospitable and modern,\u201d Sports Minister Pavel Kolobkov was quoted as saying on Tuesday by RIA<\/span> Novosti.<\/p>\n

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\u00a0AfricaNews<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/section>\n<\/div>\n<\/section>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

President Vladimir Putin played football with Fifa boss Gianni Infantino in the Kremlin on Tuesday as Russia marked 100 days before the start of the World Cup. The footage was released by football\u2019s world governing body in a tweet featuring legends of the beautiful game juggling the ball and doing tricks. The clip ended with […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":8452,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","tags":[],"news-category":[321],"yoast_head":"\n100 days to World Cup: Putin plays soccer with FIFA boss others<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"100 days to World Cup: Putin plays soccer with FIFA boss others\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/nigerianews.ca\/news\/putin-plays-soccer\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"100 days to World Cup: Putin plays soccer with FIFA boss others\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"100 days to World Cup: Putin plays soccer with FIFA boss others\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/nigerianews.ca\/news\/putin-plays-soccer\/\" 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