Kairat Almaty make record-breaking trip for historic night | OneFootball

Champions League debutants Kairat Almaty landed in Lisbon yesterday after a record-breaking journey from Kazakhstan to the Portuguese capital.

Kairat qualified for the Champions League after defeating Celtic on penalties after two goalless games with young goalkeeper Temirlan Anarbekov giving a stand-out performance.

Now, the Kazakh team get to welcome Real Madrid but first they begin at Estádio José Alvalade to take on Sporting CP in Lisbon after undertaking an epic football journey.

The journey from Almaty to Lisbon is 7,200km long (4,474 miles), the longest ever in the history of the competition and one that is taking 12 hours and has a five-hour time distance that will challenge all jet-lag prevention techniques.

There was no rest after that journey though, after landing the team underwent the usual pre-match training session on the home team's ground.

Kairat Almaty's record journey beats the previous one that also saw a Portuguese and Kazakh team face off.

Back in the 2015/16 season, Benfica and Astana played twice in the group stage, which was then a record. Sporting followed suit, being drawn with Astana in the Europa League knock-out stage two seasons later.

Curiously, the Almaty to Lisbon journey transcends sports. Sporting and Kairat have also faced off in both cities in UEFA Futsal competition in recent years so it's now a well-trodden path.

That new record of 7,200 km could be beaten in future, though. Kairat drawing against another Portuguese side, Santa Clara of Ponta Delgado in the Azores, would be even further – although Shamrock Rovers put a swift stop to the Primeira Liga outfit's European hopes last month.

The islands are in the Atlantic Ocean, meaning that if they are ever to be drawn against Almaty, there would be a distance of 8,130km (just over 5,000 miles). In context, that's virtually the same distance as travelling from London to Salvador, Brazil!