Barring a niche interest in east European football, chances are you may not have heard of Viktor Goncharenko or Alyaksandr Yermakovich.
They are the most successful coaches in the history of BATE Borisov, the leading Belorussian club from the city of Barysaw. BATE are currently enjoying the longest run of dominance in European football: 13 consecutive titles. The new season starts later this month.
Goncharenko won five titles straight between 2008 and 2012 and was succeeded by his assistant Yermakovich, who added another four between 2013 and 2016.
Viktor Goncharenko is BATE's most successful ever boss, but he had to leave to aim higher
Why Goncharenko he leave? Well, in 2013, Goncharenko accepted a position at a club in Russia, Kuban Krasnodar.
The previous season Kuban came fifth and qualified for the Europa League, but the club had experienced mixed fortunes across the previous decade.
They were relegated from the top division in 2004, 2007 and 2009, and while historically Kuban had been Russian champions, the last time was in 1987 and the time before that 1973.
These days Kuban are no longer a professional entity. The club went bankrupt in 2018, although their name continues in the Krasnodar Krai regional league.
So, why would Goncharenko desert a club so dominant, one that he had taken for the first time to the Champions League group stage, to take charge at what, frankly, appears a mid-ranking outfit? Simple: Brendan Rodgers syndrome. No new worlds to conquer.
In the same vein, Brendan Rodgers had to depart Celtic and return to the Premier League
BATE had already won the league the two years before Goncharenko took over. By the time he left, it was seven titles straight. Relative success in Europe had further strengthened their position because UEFA’s money has a corrupting influence in a league so small.
BATE, like Celtic or Dinamo Zagreb in Croatia, can use their annual UEFA windfall to recruit the best young players from around the country and later sell them on, or abroad. One revenue stream creates another, so the money builds and builds.
The year after Goncharenko left, reaching the Champions League group stage earned BATE roughly £9.4million. The current prize money for finishing second in the Belorussian Premier League is £77,000. Third place gets £35,500. So where’s the challenge?
Goncharenko left BATE for the same reason Rodgers turned his back on Celtic. Nothing he did, domestically at least, was seen as an achievement and European success was unattainable.
It was the same for Pep Guardiola at Bayern Munich. Winning the Bundesliga became par. Unless he won the Champions League, his triumphs were met with a shrug.
Rodgers may have had hundreds of thousands of Celtic fans celebrating every win, but if his ambition was to manage again in the Premier League elite, beating St Johnstone 6-0 away is nothing to put on a c.v.
Rodgers refused to provide guarantees he would stay if a Premier League club came calling
Where is Goncharenko now? He is the manager of CSKA Moscow, the second-best team in Russia last season, and currently third in the table. CSKA were desperately unfortunate not to progress beyond the Champions League group stage after beating Real Madrid home and away.
And where is Yermakovich, BATE’s second most successful manager? He is his assistant.
The move into mediocrity at Kuban worked for them, the way Rodgers hopes swapping Celtic for Leicester will benefit him.
Rodgers lost his first match as Leicester manager on Sunday, repeating inauspicious starts at Swansea and Liverpool.
It took him 69 games to lose at Celtic. Still, no doubt at Parkhead they are happy, closing in on a treble treble, just as BATE Borisov will have enjoyed a 13th straight title.
Yet competitive advantage leading to complete subjugation does not equate to credibility in the world beyond. Any ambitious young coach wants kudos and respect, too, which will not come shooting fish in a barrel.
Now Rodgers will be competing in one of the world’s best leagues with a talented squad
Every newspaper and media outlet has its own professional referee delivering comment these days, and from this we can deduce that nobody has a clue about the rules any more. Everything is up for debate and everything open to interpretation.
Take the award of a penalty to Harry Kane against Arsenal. Big mistake, said Peter Walton. Kane was offside, attempting to play the ball and challenging for it when he was pushed in the back.
Anthony Taylor, the match official, would have reversed his decision had he had access to a pitchside monitor. ‘Almost every referee would have given it as offside having looked at it on screen,’ Walton concluded.
Don’t like the sound of that ‘almost’ though, do you? It means it isn’t black and white. ‘Almost’ makes this only Walton’s interpretation. And it may be a majority view. But a majority is not the same as unanimity.
VAR will operate in the Premier League next season, but offside calls will not be black or white
Sure enough, Keith Hackett was calling it a penalty all day. Merely running towards the ball does not constitute an offside offence, he insisted. Kane had not yet interfered with play when Shkodran Mustafi fouled him. The push occurred before the offside, and Taylor was correct.
So, who is right? That is the point: they all are. It is a matter of personal interpretation whether the referee considers Kane active before the push or not. And the idea that this will be resolved by VAR next season is equally fanciful.
VAR as a term sounds cold, clinical, certain. But it stands for Video Assistant Referee. So it’s a bloke. A bloke like Walton or Hackett who had opposing conclusions on whether Kane was offside.
So it is possible a referee will be handed down his VAR verdict, reverse his judgment, then go home, see a replay and think he was right all along.
It is possible the official in the television studio, deployed to explain complex calls to viewers at home, will disagree with the VAR verdict.
As for consistency, extremely similar incidents at two matches could be assessed in entirely different ways. We have thankfully moved past the old cliche about half the population not understanding offside, but it really would help if referees still did.
Time for a Noble stand?The opening of the Billy Bonds Stand at the London Stadium on Saturday was beautifully done.
Bobby Moore and Sir Trevor Brooking also have ends of the ground named in their honour. Leaving one as yet unclaimed.
He did not win a World Cup, or play in an era when the club
