Oleg Salenko entered the history of world football forever. He scored five goals in one game of the FIFA World Cup. This happened in 1994 in a match between the national teams of Russia and Cameroon.
Childhood and adolescence of Oleg Salenko
Oleg was born on October 25, 1969 in Leningrad. His mother was Russian, and his father was Ukrainian. Since childhood, he began to get involved in football and enrolled in the children's football school "Friendship". And then he went to study at the famous Leningrad football school "Smena". It was there that he was noticed by representatives of the St. Petersburg Zenith. Then they paid 36 thousand rubles for the young football player. This was the first official transfer in the history of Soviet football.
Oleg Salenko's football career
Oleg made his debut for Zenit at the age of 16 and immediately scored the winning goal, coming on as a substitute in the first meeting. The fans of the team loved him and supported the young striker in everything. Therefore, when he decided to move to Dynamo Kiev in 1988, it was a real shock for them. But then the Kievites were the flagships of Soviet football, and the Petersburgers were in the second ten.
However, in Dynamo Salenko did not become a player in the main team and basically came out as a substitute. At the same time, he managed to become the Champion of the USSR in 1990.
In 1992 Salenko decided to move to Spain. At first he played a couple of seasons for Logrones, and only then for Valencia. In Spain, he established himself as a goal striker and in one of the seasons he scored 16 goals, which is still a record for all Russian and Soviet footballers who have ever played in the Spanish championship.
After that, in 1995, Oleg was bought by the Scottish Glasgow Rangers. But in this country, Salenko had many problems, including a robbery at home, his wife's pregnancy, and so on. Therefore, he failed to play, and the next year he moved to the Turkish club Istanbulspor.
In Turkey, Oleg again began to score a lot, but a series of injuries followed. He urgently needed knee surgery, but the process was constantly delayed. Therefore, he never returned to big football.
There were timid attempts to do this. First, he tried to play in Spain for Cordoba. But after spending several matches for the team, Salenko was forced to leave the team. He then moved to Poland, where he played only one match for the Pogon club from Szczecin. And only after that he officially announced the end of his football career.
Salenko spent only 8 matches for the Russian national team, but scored 6 goals. All of them were credited to the 1994 World Cup. After the collapse of the USSR, he played only one match for the Ukrainian national team. It was a friendly meeting with the Hungarians in 1992.
Life after football
After completing his football career, Salenko moved to live in Ukraine. There he worked as the head coach of the Ukrainian beach soccer team. And also managed to train several amateur teams. Salenko is a successful businessman and doesn't care much about tomorrow.
On the personal front, the former footballer is also doing well. Oleg has been married for a long time. His wife's name is Irina, and she bore him a son, Alexander.
