While fans in France for Euro 2016 try to steer clear of Russian hooligans, and some officials seek to repair damage done to preparations for the country's World Cup in two years' time, others seem to be revelling in its growing pariah status.
“A normal, proper guy is a surprise for them,” Vladimir Markin said as French police blamed Russians for the worst clashes with English fans in Marseilles.
“They’re used to the kind of ‘guys’ they see at gay parades.”
Markin is no marginal rabble-rouser, but the spokesman for Russia’s Investigative Committee, a major law-enforcement agency.
As he smirked, European soccer's governing body, Uefa, opened disciplinary proceedings against Russia and threatened to throw its team and England out of Euro 2016 if there is any repeat of fighting that injured about 35 people.
And in a sign that French authorities are toughening their stance, Russian fans said police stopped their bus on Tuesday morning and ordered them off. It was not clear if they would be allowed to travel to Lille for tomorrow’s game against Slovakia.
After initially playing down the violence, Russian sports minister Vitaly Mutko - under huge pressure over a doping scandal that could see Russian athletes barred from this summer’s Olympics - was among several officials to say the hooligans had “shamed their country”.
But in state media, which portrays Russia as the victim of western conspiracy and aggression, some coverage struck a triumphant note.
“Two-hundred-and-fifty Russian fans repelled an attack by several thousand English, and forced them to flee,” the Rossiya channel reported.
“Russians from all corners of our country did not flinch and repulsed the attack of the heavily intoxicated islanders.”
It was a tone shared by Igor Lebedev, the ultra-nationalist deputy speaker of Russia’s parliament and a member of the executive committee of Russian football’s governing body.
“I don’t understand all these politicians and officials who are now criticising our fans,” he wrote on Twitter.
“I don’t see anything bad about fans having a fight. On the contrary, well done, lads. Keep it up!”
Lebedev laid the blame squarely on French police for mishandling security around the match.
“Of course, fights happen. But these are fans, and they have to have a fight. And without fans there is no football,” Lebedev explained.
“They could have taken the feistiest fans to the Marseilles woods (to fight), so they’d have let off a bit of steam there and in the stadium they’d have supported the players.”
Such an approach to security will not inspire confidence ahead of the 2018 World Cup, which President Vladimir Putin hoped would crown Russia’s return to the status of a global power.
Russia finds itself increasingly isolated and sanctioned however, on issues ranging from its annexation of Crimea from Ukraine and its backing for Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad, to a string of corruption and doping scandals.
Putin and his allies will remain defiant, no doubt, and continue to blame Russia’s problems on its perceived enemies - whether in the White House, Brussels or on the terraces.
