Slutsky is a child of Volgograd. He was born there 48 years ago, studied physical education at the state university, played football and trained at various clubs in the region and will never forget his humble beginnings.
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The Leonid Slutsky Football School
To help football to develop in his own Volgograd, in December 2016 Slutsky decided to set up his own football school. Quickly 200 to 250 soccer players signed up. At the opening prominent athletes were present such as Yelena Isinbayeva, Tatyana Lebedeva and Yelena Slesarenko. Football players including Igor Smolnikov, Alan Dzagoev, Aleksandr Golovin and the Berezutsky brothers occasionally helped the academy by providing new balls, shirts and so on.
The players at the academy were trained by former coaches from Olimpia Volgograd, the club where Slutsky started his coaching career in 1992. Because the academy did not have its own stadium, they trained on the artificial grass pitches of the Volgograd State Academy of Physical Education. Slutsky paid 30 percent of the rent for those pitches. 70 percent came from the budget of the Volgograd region.
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Merge With Rotor Volgograd
Since May 2018 everything gradually changed. At the cup final between FC Tosno and Avangard Kursk, Slutsky bumped into the governor of the former city of Stalingrad. Andrey Bocharov told Slutsky about his plans with Rotor Volgograd. At that time, Rotor were still in the third division, but they were close to promotion.
However, in order to get a license for the Football National League (FNL), Rotor had to have an official youth academy. At the time the club didn’t have one. Bocharov therefore suggested that Slutsky’s football school could be incorporated in the Rotor football club. A solution that cuts both ways, Bocharov explained.
While working abroad Slutsky could be confident his players were in good hands and Rotor could help those players to develop further and could offer them a nice stage by playing in the Football National League. Slutsky agreed, on the condition that Rotor would not interfere with his training methods and the football philosophy.
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Slutsky Paid For Coaching Certification And Salaries
However, soon problems arose. The trainers of an official youth academy of a club in the Football National League must be licensed. Not all of the coaches had a license and therefore Slutsky took care of their training costs.
However, Rotor decided not to take all the trainers from the Slutsky school, while Slutsky said they promised to do so. Three trainers were not placed on the payroll. Slutsky could not accept that and decided to continue to pay the salary of these coaches.
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Young Players Were Left Behind
In addition, Rotor transferred the teams of only five groups to their academy. Those players belonged to the “2005-2009” age category. The players born between 2010 and 2013 were left behind.
Rotor is a state-sponsored club. And by the federal standards of the Ministry of Sport public schools are not permitted to enroll children under nine years old. Therefore all the younger players stayed at the Slutsky academy.
According to Rotor, that was also the problem with the trainers and the number of training sessions they could offer. The federal standards only allow a limited number of training sessions per week and a limited number of coaches, Rotor emphasized.
And to cap it all, Slutsky was told the following by the Ministry of Sport: players from the 2010-2013 age group were allowed to continue using the fields of the Volgograd State Academy of Physical Education, but from then on Slutsky had to pay one hundred percent of the rent. The region decided to cut off their financial aid.
“Can you imagine? When the field belonged to the municipality, I paid 30% and when it became owned by Rotor, with whom we all collaborated collaboratively, I had to pay 100% of the rent. ” (After much toing and froing the governor changed his mind and gave the football field for free for one year to Slutsky and associates).
Slutsky was furious. And he got even angrier when he found out that Rotor only paid his trainers half their original salary.
Trip To Vitesse Arnhem
In November 2018, Slutsky organized a trip for the footballers and trainers of his football school. 86 children from 7 to 13 years and 9 coaches settled in Arnhem in the Netherlands, where Slutsky had been Vitesse’s trainer for a few months at that time. Slutsky paid for the trip, arranging practice games and buses and so on. Costs in total: 35,000 euros.
Slutsky would prefer to organize even more foreign internships and tournaments for the young football players like this, but according to the man himself, he doesn’t get any support from Rotor and the governor. In fact, trainers who went to these overseas tournaments and trips had to take leave and would not receive any salary during these days. If they raised the issues, they risked dismissal from Rotor or a fine.
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‘Morons’ And Ego
The headline above was a quote from Slutsky in early October 2019 in a interview with KraSava, a hugely popular YouTube series by former striker Evgeny Savin.
“Rotor Volgograd is led by morons. I’m talking specifically about Rotor. There’s too much ego about there. They trained with my balls, my equipment, and shirts. That was all possible thanks to my contract with Nike. I have arranged additional tournaments. But nobody from Rotor ever thanked me. “
In the interview, Slutsky also talks about one of the foreign tournaments where he wanted to go with youth players. Rotor gave permission for participation, but on the condition that the players would play under the name of Rotor and that Slutsky would pay Rotor for the journey of all the players and trainers in advance.
They wanted me to transfer that money to Rotor’s account and then I would have to hope that they would spend that money well. Then I said: “Basta, karapluziki (editors note: beetles in Russian). Figure it out with Andrey Rekechinsky (CEO of Rotor)!”
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The Reaction Of Rotor Volgograd
Rekechinsky, a former water polo player, has said he doesn’t understand anything of the Slutsky’s complaints. In his eyes, Rotor is not doing anything wrong.
Rotor must simply comply with federal laws and regulations and must also be able to justify every cent spent. That’s why it is difficult to hire more trainers, to organize extra training sessions and to participate in foreign tournaments. “Leonid is an expressive, emotional person. We have to work according to the existing laws. Slutsky maybe doesn’t understand this. Why can’t I take my children to Holland and so on…”
Complaint Filed Against Slutsky
Stella Vartanyan, the President of the Public Council of the Committee of Physical Culture and Sports of the Volgograd Region, wrote a letter on October 23 to the President of the Russian Football Union, Aleksandr Dyukov. Vartanyan complained about the “harsh, offensive and unreasonable statements” of Slutsky and asked the RFU to start a preliminary inquiry.
However, the RFU doesn’t have the authority to sanction a coach in a foreign country and therefore even refused to start an investigation. Andrey Sozin, a member of the RFU Ethical Committee, said Slutsky must learn to control his temper. “He has done a good job in Volgograd, but he does not understand how it works.”
“If the Rotor Academy was his personal academy, then he could do anything. But Rotor has to take account of a federal budget, federal money. They’ve to play by the federal rules. If that’s good or bad, that’s another discussion. But in my point of view, it’s certainly not necessary to call Rotor “morons”. They’ve never insulted Slutsky.”
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New Stadium in Volgograd, Paid By Slutsky and The Berezutsky Brothers
It’s clear that, according to Slutsky, the academy of Rotor, is led in a very amateurish way. At the same time, Slutsky states that he invests around 140,000 euros into his football school every year and doesn’t get a penny in return. Then why does he want to continue with his Volgograd football project?
“Because I’m a Volgograd citizen because I love this city”, Slutsky said. “And because of some assholes who don’t allow our football to develop… I’m not going to hold out my hand. I love my city and the players. Volgograd gave me an education and the opportunity to become who I am. And to earn some money. This is my share I would like to return to the city.”
And Slutsky is not finished yet. To give even more football players the chance to enjoy more and better training sessions in Volgograd, he wants to build a new stadium with stands for several hundred spectators.
Slutsky will pay around 630,000 euros for this stadium, together with the Berezutsky brothers, his assistants at Vitesse. The finalisation of the stadium is planned for June 2020. When it comes to his native town, Slutsky apparently doesn’t have limits his selflessness.
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