Aleksandrs Kulakovs (born 4 March 1956 in Dedinovo) is a former Latvian

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kick (football), kicking a football (ball), ball to score a goal (sports), goal. Unqualified, football (word), the word ''football'' generally means the form of football t ...

goalkeeper In many team sports that involve scoring goal (sport), goals, the goalkeeper (sometimes termed goaltender, netminder, GK, goalie, or keeper) is a designated player charged with directly preventing the opposing team from scoring by blocking or i ...

who played for the biggest part of his career for

Daugava Rīga FK Daugava Rīga was a Latvian football club, based at the Daugava Stadium in Riga. They played in the Latvian Higher League. The last manager of the team was Armands Zeiberliņš. From the club's foundation in 2003 till 2009 the club was kno ...

. At the age of 15 Kulakovs was the first goalkeeper for Spartak Lukhovitsy. After having seen him play for the

Russian SFSR The Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (Russian SFSR or RSFSR), previously known as the Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic and the Russian Soviet Republic, and unofficially as Soviet Russia,Declaration of Rights of the labo ...

team,

Konstantin Beskov Konstantin Ivanovich Beskov (; 18 November 1920 – 6 May 2006) was a Soviet/Russian footballer and coach. Beskov was born in Moscow. He played for Dynamo Moscow as forward, scoring 126 goals, and after finishing his playing career he became ...

offered Kulakovs to move to the reserves squad for

FC Dynamo Moscow FC Dynamo Moscow (''FC Dynamo Moskva'', , ) is a Russian professional association football, football club based in Moscow. Dynamo returned to the Russian Premier League for the 2017–18 season after one season in the second-tier Russian Footba ...

. In 1974, he moved to VEF Rīga in

Latvia Latvia, officially the Republic of Latvia, is a country in the Baltic region of Northern Europe. It is one of the three Baltic states, along with Estonia to the north and Lithuania to the south. It borders Russia to the east and Belarus to t ...

and won the Latvian championship in 1974 and 1975. In 1976, he moved to Daugava Rīga, the top club in Soviet Latvia which at the time played in the second division of Soviet football. In the first seasons he had to battle for his position on the field with

Laimonis Laizāns Laimonis Laizāns (born 30 January 1945, died 16 November 2020) was a Soviet Latvian football goalkeeper who played for FK Daugava Rīga and Torpedo Moscow. He is considered one of the best Latvian goalkeepers of all time. Playing biography La ...

and Rolands Žagars but soon he became the undisputed number one goalie for Daugava. From 1977 to 1989 he played in 330 matches for Daugava and was succeeded by

Oļegs Karavajevs Oļegs Karavajevs (13 February 1961 – 6 October 2020) was a Latvian professional association football, footballer who played as a goalkeeper (association football), goalkeeper. He was the goalkeeper who made the most appearances for the Latvia ...

at the club. In 1991, Kulakovs won the Latvian league with Forums Skonto. Kulakovs also played in one international game for

in 1992. Kulakovs retired from playing and moved to coaching. He currently is the goalkeeping coach for FC Skonto and the Latvia national team.

References

* 1956 births People from Lukhovitsky District Living people Latvian men's footballers Latvia men's international footballers FC Daugava Riga players Men's association football goalkeepers Soviet men's footballers {{Latvia-footy-bio-stub