FC Sochi continues to change coaches

The Sochi football club, which ranks last in the Russian championship standings, announced the removal of head coach Alexander Tochilin from his duties. Instead, Denis Klyuev will lead the players in the last match before the winter break against Orenburg. Thus, the Sochi team has undergone the second change of head coach since the beginning of this season, the third this year and the fourth in the last twelve months.

On the actual release from duties of head coach Alexander Tochilin of FC Sochi announced on its official website the day after the defeat in the 17th round of the Russian championship from the Samara “Wings of the Soviets” – 0:2. The short message states that by decision of the club’s management, the 49-year-old specialist was removed from working with the team, and Denis Klyuev will act as head coach at the final game of the calendar year against Orenburg, which will be held in Sochi next Sunday.

Alexander Tochilin, who had already headed Sochi from July 2018 to November 2019 and from July to November 2022, became the second head coach of the club since the beginning of the season. After the defeat of the Sochi team by Spartak in the eighth round in mid-September, he replaced Dmitry Khokhlov in this post, but failed to achieve a qualitative improvement in the game. Moreover, the southerners lowered their results. Having played nine matches at the championship under the leadership of Tochilin, they lost seven of them, two each to Zenit and Krylya Sovetov, one each to Fakel, Nizhny Novgorod and Rubin, achieving only an away victory over Ural “in the 12th round (4:1) and drawing (3:3) the home match of the 14th round against Dynamo. At the moment, the team, which debuted in the Russian Premier League in 2019, became a silver medalist the season before, and finished tenth last season, is in last place with only ten points. Up to 12th place, which guarantees maintaining a residence permit in the Russian Premier League (RPL), is nine points.

As for Denis Klyuev, so far this 50-year-old specialist, who came to Sochi along with Tochilin, looks like a temporary figure.

The fact is that his experience of independent coaching is so far limited to leading the youth teams of the Moscow Lokomotiv and Ural.

Note that recently FC Sochi has been changing head coaches more often than any other RPL club. On December 25, 2022, Kurban Berdyev came to lead the team instead of Alexander Tochilin, and on April 10, Dmitry Khokhlov was appointed in his place. Thus, the current change of head coach in Sochi is the third since the beginning of the year, and in the last twelve months it is already the fourth.

Evgeniy Fedyakov