Kairat Almaty Set to Host Real Madrid in Historic Champions League Clash

Football fans across Kazakhstan are eagerly anticipating what is being hailed as one of the most significant sporting events in the nation’s history.

On Tuesday, Kairat Almaty will host their first-ever home match in the UEFA Champions League, facing off against European giants Real Madrid at the Almaty Central Stadium, The Caspian Post reports, citing The Times of Central Asia.

The arrival of Madrid’s Galácticos has electrified the city, with fans camping outside the Intercontinental Hotel in Almaty just to catch a glimpse of the visiting superstars.

Kairat lost their first match 4-1 to Sporting Lisbon, a scoreline that the management felt didn’t do justice to a spirited performance. “The team lost focus for about five minutes, conceding three goals, but never gave up and scored a goal in the Champions League - the first in our club’s history. That experience is valuable,” Kairat Boranbaev, the club’s president, told The Times of Central Asia at the club’s training complex this week.

“We understand that the Champions League has the 36 best teams in Europe, so the level is extremely high. We don’t stress about the result; the team gains huge experience.” Boranbaev said, proudly adding that six Kairat academy products played in the match.

The fifty-nine-year-old president and business magnate is not surprised his club has reached the higher echelons of European football. “This strategic work was built more than ten years ago, and we have been moving toward it all these years. I think it’s a natural result, a systematic effort by our club.”

Boranbaev says that when he took over the club’s presidency in 2012, the facilities were well below par. Kairat is traditionally Kazakhstan’s most storied club, their famed black-and-yellow jerseys representing all-Kazakhstan in the Soviet Top League in the communist years. But they had fallen on hard times in the independence era, even splitting into two rival clubs for a time.

“When we arrived, there was only one burned-down base from Soviet times,” Boranbaev told TCA. “We started developing, learning what football really is. Today, all the infrastructure is established, youth player development is in place, and the coaching staff training is organized. That’s why the results we’ve achieved today are the outcome of years of stable, professional management.”