Russia beats Hungary in water polo

Associated Press, Belgrade, Yugoslavia

Revaz Chomakhidze scored the game-winning goal with just a few seconds remaining and Dmitriy Stvatan added three more as Russia beat defending Olympic champion Hungary 10-9 Sunday to win the FINA water polo World Cup.

With time running out and the score level at 9-9, Chomakhidze fired a desperate but successful long shot from almost the middle of the pool that decided the outcome.

The match between the water polo heavyweights went back and forth as Hungary led 3-2 after one quarter and 6-4 after two.

Russia bounced back in the third and entered the final period on even ground at 8-8 before some 5,000 spectators, who mostly cheered the Russians.

Tibor Benedek led the way for Hungary with three goals while Tamas Kasas and Gergely Kiss had two each. The other scorers were Rajmund Fodor and Tamas Molnar.

Besides Stvatan's three, Russia got two each from Chomakhidze, Alexandr Eryshov and Irek Zinnurov. Dmitriy Gorshkov scored once.

Also Saturday, Yugoslavia beat Italy 6-4 to clinch third place at the eight-nation event.

Dejan Savic and Aleksandar Sapic each scored twice for Yugoslavia while Italy's Bogdan Rath, Francesco Postiglione, Leonardo Binchi and Federico Mistrangelo got one each.

The World Cup event - held at the renovated Tasmajdan sports center in downtown Belgrade - is the biggest international competition in the Yugoslav capital after 10 years of punitive international sanctions against the country imposed for fomenting the 1990s Balkan wars.