On December 28, local time, unfortunate news came from the Russian city of Rostov on don, and Uzbekistan veteran international Nikolai Sersov died of illness at the age of 47.
Sersov played as a midfielder and spent the second half of his club career mainly in rostov teams and played in the Russian Premier League for six seasons.
From 1996 to 2005, he played 64 games for the national team, scoring 13 goals. As a core member of the national team, Schersov participated in the Asian Cup in 1996, 2000 and 2004.
In his national team career, Sersov played three times with the Chinese men's football team. These three games are more impressive to Chinese fans.
The earliest clash took place in the 1996 Asian Cup group stage, when Uzbekistan beat China 2-0 and Sersov came off the bench. This ball, coupled with the later famous "Naoki Soma goal", made the Chinese team almost out of the group stage of the Asian Cup.
The other two clashes took place at the 2002 FIFA World Cup Asian Zone Final 10. In the last round, Uzbekistan played at home against China. In injury time, the opponent pressed on the whole line, Yang Pu failed to effectively release Lu Shang's oblique pass under the interference of Kasimov, Sersov met the ball thirty meters away in the middle of the penalty area, Fu Bin's vision was blocked, and the ball was stuck to the right goalpost into the net to complete the kill.
Sersov stripped wildly to celebrate, and the fans were thrilled. The goal was also Sersov's only goal against China. In the end, Uzbekistan defeated the national football team 1-0, breaking the unbeaten golden body of the national football team in the top ten.
However, at that time, the Chinese team had successfully qualified, entered the World Cup final round in advance, and the loss was no longer painful. Uzbekistan, on the other hand, did not qualify for the play-offs if it won.