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| Evgeny Grebenkin. Courtesy RGF |
Sovietski Sport has now announced that the council of the Russian Gymnastics Federation has appointed bars coach Evgeny Grebenkin as head coach of the WAG team.
Valentina Rodionenko made the following statement :
"On Monday took place the Coachesā board of the national team. The decision was made to relieve Alexander Alexandrov of his duties as head coach of the Russian team.This decision was made because he is Aliya Mustafinaās personal coach. Heāll remain Aliyaās personal coach. Heāll be replaced by Yevgeny Anatolevich Grebenkin. We cannot have someone as head coach and as personal coach. [Aleksandrov] bet on his pupil. We put up with this during a certain time. Then all the coachesā group rebelled. The medals are the result of a groupās work. Nobody understands why this is associated to a single individual. Gymnastics is not like athletics, where technique is taught by one coach and then the athlete runs. We have four events and each event has a specialist. The head coach has to organize work. Not to teach, because this is done by other people, but to organize. And the organization failed, - said Valentina Rodionenko."
44 year old Grebenkin from Volzhski has been the specialist bars coach for the Russian team this quad, and led the Russian team to a position of prominence on this apparatus, where they rival the Chinese for number one spot. I very much hope he can make a success of his newly expanded responsibilities and bring Russia to a similar point in the all around and team stakes.
With thanks to Lupita for the link, and the rapid translation!!
Well I am glad it is a coach I really like :) Good for Grebenkin, hope he will be able to do well. Hopefully now we can stop hearing griping from any other coach about the head coach and everyone just does their job.
ReplyDeleteSince he is head coach, Russia will need a new bars coach then, wouldn't they? I wonder who that will be.
I won't even bother with Valentina's comments about the organization failed. They won 8 medals at Olympics and if Valentina and her husband would stop undermining the head coach, it will also help a lot.
Good luck to Grebenkin, the girls seem to like him a lot so that is good.
Now I hope Alexandrov will be able to stay after December 30th and continue being Aliya's coach.
No more hostilities between coaches, they all need to work together.
Thanks Lupita for the translation and thanks for the quick post.
I highly doubt Alexandrov is really going to stay in this organization after being demoted to personal coach and stabbed in the back by many of them. The only reason he would probably stay is for the sake of Aliya's career, but there is going to be a lot of bad blood around if he does and it could potentially even be worse for Aliya if he did.
ReplyDeleteEither way, it sucks for Aliya because it's clear that a lot of the people overseeing the Russian team do not want her to succeed, and even moreso now after she completely humilited them by coming away as the most successful gymnast after they all paraded around Komova and Grishina as the new queens of Russian gymnastics. Apparently she posted "emptiness, no emotion, no thoughts, nothing" to her VK. So sad.
Prejudice? In Russia Aliya is in a minority group and this does not seem to be celebrated at all as we have with Douglas. In fact nothing is said. Sadly, that could be not only because of fear of prejudice (even outside Russia as from her name Russians would understand her ethnic minority). But I have also seem comments on Russian sites from her own ethinic group calling her a disgrace. Getting it from both ends must really suck. But I wonder if this person could be prejudice, it seems she really wants to toss Aliya out and what kind of insanity is that when she has brought so much success?
DeleteHey Elizabeth and Lupita, when you have time, could you translate this interview with Valentina?
ReplyDeleteShe is talking about the dismissal of Alexandrov from his post.
http://www.sovsport.ru/news/text-item/553986
Thanks
I like Yevgeny Grebyonkin, I think he and Aliya have a great rapport, and he did an amazing job for Russia UB work.
ReplyDeleteI said this before, I would have prefer that Alexander kept his head coach position and Grebyonkin to be Aliya's personal coach (actually, in the Russia Gymnastic official page, you can read, on Aliya profile "Coach: National Team Coaches" which makes Grebyonkin one of her personal coaches 0_0) .
Also, since the reason for Alexandrov dismissal is that the head coach can't have a single gymnast under his wing, does this mean that Ekaterina Baturina doesn't have a personal coach anymore??
on different note it seems that Grishina left her coach and will be training with Irina Razumovskaya, wonder if this is a result of the Olympics or the recent news.