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Serbian coach Dusan Ivkovic will no longer work with Dynamo Moscow. The official website of the “blue and white” reported this yesterday. The coach's two-year contract has expired; the management of the capital's club will not renew its relationship with Ivkovic. The decision is quite logical - under the Serb, the oldest team in the country remained without medals in the national championship for two years, although in matters of recruitment, the Serb was given complete carte blanche, since Dynamo had solid financial resources.

Let us recall that Ivkovic began working in Russia from the 2002/03 season, heading CSKA after Valery Tikhonenko, under whom the army team finished below the medal list in the Super League for two years in a row. Under the leadership of the Serb, the army team reached the quartet of the strongest teams in the ULEB Euroleague three times in a row, but never won the title, failing the home Final Four in the spring of 2005. After the expiration of the contract, the contract with Ivkovic was not renewed for obvious reasons, but almost immediately this coach was in demand by Dynamo.

Over the past two seasons, one of the most prosperous clubs in the country has nothing special to boast about. Fifth place in the 2005/06 Super League championship, fourth place in the final classification of the recently concluded championship. Last year, Dynamo managed not to reach the Final Four of the Russian Cup, losing on aggregate to their Moscow teammates. Dynamo did not get this trophy this spring either - a crushing defeat with a difference of 19 points from CSKA in the semi-finals.

Muscovites won the ULEB Cup 2006, but not everyone views this tournament as self-sufficient; victory here is valued more from the point of view of qualifying for the Euroleague. Winning a continental trophy can in no way mitigate the negative of outright failures in two consecutive Russian championships.

During his five years in our country, Ivkovic never considered it necessary to speak Russian at press conferences, although he knows it quite well. In this aspect, the former head coach of the Russian men's volleyball team Zoran Gajić compares favorably with his basketball colleague. But the two coaches have one thing in common. Once appointed, they immediately try to surround themselves with compatriots in various positions, be it director of public relations or general physical training specialist. Russian basketball and volleyball did not receive any benefit from such Serbian teams, but the employers of Ivkovic and Gajich had to fork out for the salaries of a group of people of very dubious qualifications.

At the same time, it should be noted that Serbian coaches have some kind of mystical magic of influencing sports functionaries in clubs or national federations. For example, Gayich, under whose leadership the Russian national team showed an unsatisfactory result at the 2006 World Championships (seventh place), after his resignation was in no hurry to leave our country and, oddly enough, found a new job. According to some reports, he has already signed a contract with Iskra Odintsovo, which sets the highest goals for the next season.

According to Israeli media, one of the most likely candidates for the vacant post of head coach of Dynamo is Russian national team coach David Blatt, now working at the Italian Benetton. His appearance in the Super League club would be quite logical, because for now Blatt is following the events in our championship and the performance of candidates for the national team from a respectful distance.

Ilya TRISVIATSKY