"Unfortunately, he did not watch the match itself, because he was flying from Minsk to Moscow at that time, he was on board of a plane," said Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov.

"He was informed about the results of the match as soon as he got off the plane. He reacted like the rest of our country, very positively, this is an important victory for us all, very joyful, that is why, the president was happy too," Peskov told reporters.

The spokesman added that Putin had not called Russia head coach Stanislav Cherchesov.

Russia beat Egypt 3-1 in St. Petersburg on Tuesday night to all but book a berth in the Round of 16, something the national team had failed to do in their previous three World Cup outings.