Playing our way

I want my teams to stay active.

We don’t want to sit back and hope something will happen, or give up if we concede a goal. If something doesn’t work, we adjust, but we continue in this active way, with belief, togetherness and a strong energy. 

This is how with Aris Limassol – a Cypriot club that had not played a European game before 2023 – we were able to compete with Glasgow Rangers, Real Betis and Sparta Prague in the Europa League. We were brave and active in all five phases of football.

The game is not only two phases – with or without the ball – but the transitions to both, plus set-pieces. And you have to understand that these phases are always changing in a game. One moment you have the ball, then you lose it to the opponent. When you get the ball back, at that moment you must decide whether to attack or go for ball possession. For me, it has always been clear that you have to educate players in all the phases. 

During my time at RB Leipzig, I learned how important it is to put collective pressure on the ball, as a team. It is important to always be active. Many coaches have their doubts about how possible it is to press for 90 minutes, but it is possible. We have not achieved the physical limit yet.

On my coaching staff at Aris Limassol I have had Dr Christos Papadopoulos, who is responsible for medical rehab and performance training. He also worked for 20 years in the Bundesliga, with Schalke 04 and VfB Stuttgart. It is interesting to hear from him how, when he started working in the Bundesliga, players used to have a surprisingly naive approach to recovery.

Nowadays, the young players in academies are well-educated, with top specialists teaching them. They know at a young age what is good for them, what is good to eat at particular times of the day, what to drink and when to take the supplements. They know the negative influence of alcohol, caffeine and nicotine for recovery. Things have changed a lot. Everything develops and gets faster and you have to move with the times, otherwise you are lost.

“Parents said to me: ‘Coach, you are 19. How did you do this?’”

My early sporting education came from growing up in a sports family. My grandpa on my mother’s side was a famous fencer, who won Olympic medals. My mum met my dad at a sports university, and my dad was a professional football player – we moved from Belarus to Germany when he signed for a German club in 1994. With those influences I had to be an athlete.

I started playing football very early and had the passion – and some talent also – to be a professional player. I was playing in Stuttgart’s academy and was selected for the Belarus national team at Under-15, then for the Under-17 European Championship in Italy. But unfortunately, at 16 years old, I got a very difficult back injury. For two or three years, I travelled around the world, meeting many doctors and specialists. We tried everything, but unfortunately nothing really helped.

The professional advice was that, with this injury and pain, it would be difficult to have a professional playing career. It was hard, but I had to decide to start something new. So I finished my schooling, and started university and my coaching licences.

I became head coach of an Under-17 team, which was curious for the parents because I was only 19 myself. It was a team where the players often had difficult backgrounds, where many players didn’t really go to school and didn’t like to train.

After some weeks, we had a training session where 20 players turned up. The parents said to me: “Coach, you are 19. How did you do this? They want to go to training!” It showed me that I could inspire people and, although it was not so easy, I enjoyed it. That was the first step to something bigger.

Soon Stuttgart gave me the chance to train their Under-12s, and then Under-13s, together with Domenico Tedesco. I say to every coach now, it is very important to progress through all the age groups, to see what is important at different stages, because you cannot train the same at all ages. It always depends on what is needed from the psychological, biomechanical, physiological and sporting sides. I’m very proud that I worked through all the age groups.

“The club’s owner was inspired by the playing style of Dynamo Kyiv in the 1990s, under the legendary Valeriy Lobanovskyi”

That includes my time at RB Leipzig, where I moved in 2013. At that time everything was starting at the club, with the first team still playing in the third division. For me, it was my first full-time coaching job. 

RB Leipzig was a great experience, because I saw everything from the beginning – how the RB project was built, with Ralf Rangnick co-ordinating everything. I was there as they recruited the best specialists in all areas, such as sports science and analysis. I saw that it is not simply about training something – you need a clear philosophy. That is what we had.

I spent five and a half years at RB Leipzig, and learned a lot. At that time, Julian Nagelsmann – who is less than a year older than me – went to Hoffenheim. I saw that he was a head coach in the Bundesliga, while I was still in academy football. Although I enjoyed it a lot at RB Leipzig, I thought perhaps if I stayed it would take more time to get my chance to coach higher. 

It was around that time I received a chance to become a head coach at Dynamo Brest, which was an interesting project in the country of my birth. The club’s owner was inspired by the playing style of Dynamo Kyiv in the 1990s, under the legendary Valeriy Lobanovskyi – one of the best coaches ever. Lobanovskyi was someone who thought much more than other coaches, which was why he was so successful with Kyiv, including a memorable Champions League run.

So the Dynamo Brest owner was a big Lobanovskyi fan and wanted to implement that kind of philosophy. Additionally, he had signed Diego Maradona as chairman. As a child, I had watched Maradona playing at the 1994 World Cup. Of course, he was a football icon. Although I knew that it would not be easy at Brest, because I knew the philosophy, mentality and culture of football in Belarus, I said to my dad: “I’m not afraid. Let’s do this.”

Maradona came to one home game. It was a big show when he arrived at the airport, then a really big show in the stadium. The day after the game, the owner said to me and the team: “Diego wants to meet you.” The appointment was in the morning, so we were in the dressing room waiting for him… one hour, then two hours, then three.

“To meet an idol like Maradona is something you never forget”

I called the owner and asked: “What’s going on? Is Diego coming?” And he said to me: “Coach, wait, he’s in the hotel room. He needs an hour’s sleep.”

After six hours, he came to the dressing room. Imagine, six hours we were waiting in the dressing room for Diego Maradona! He came and shook all of our hands, but didn’t recognise me, thinking I was a player. It was explained to him that I was the head coach, then he said some motivational words.

On his right hand he was wearing four Rolex watches, and on the left hand five Rolex watches. Crazy! But to meet an idol like Maradona is something you never forget. With the energy that he brought inside the room, it was nice to see him.

It was not so easy at the club, though, because of the obstacles and conditions there. I was in a completely different world to the one I had come from at RB Leipzig. I understood after the first day that it would be difficult to demand something special. But, even if it was only a short period I spent there, we got some good results.

They had lost six games before I arrived. In my first game I changed something and we won 6-1 away. A few weeks later, in the Europa League, we won a European tie for the first time in the club’s history. Then we had a home game and some of the players didn’t have the right attitude towards their recovery.

I said: “Okay, we either do things in a professional way or not.” So I spoke to the owner and explained that even if they are important players, as the head coach I cannot accept their behaviour: “You have to act.” Now, after some years’ experience, I feel that perhaps I was too categorical in that moment. In the end we agreed it would be best for both parties if we went our separate ways.

If you go to a country with a different culture, you have to be prepared for different situations. You have to be sure of yourself, and that you can deal with it. At the time I was less experienced, maybe inspired and shaped by top academies, but rather unprepared for what awaited me.

“It was not so easy in the beginning because the coaches before had played the ball-holding Spanish style”

A couple of months after I left Dynamo Brest, the owner of FC Kairat called me. He said that his academy coaches were studying in Leipzig; he was a big fan of the Red Bull philosophy and he wanted to build the same in Almaty, in Kazakhstan. He needed a coach and I was the right one, because I came from the Red Bull school and also speak Russian.

I knew the city, but I could not imagine what everything looked like there. When I saw the facilities, I saw the possibilities. They were fantastic, comparable to a top Premier League club. Four pitches with undersoil heating, a big pitch under a roof, our own hotel, a big swimming pool and gym. We had everything there to work.

The owner had invested a lot to try to become champions, previously signing Andrey Arshavin and Anatoliy Tymoshchuk. When I came, he said to me: “I want to build something new, with young players from the academy.” Because it was one of the best in the country. You can see that they have recently sold 16-year-old Dastan Satpaev to Chelsea for €4m.

They wanted to be clever in the way that they worked, so it was the right step for me. In the first season we finished runners-up, a point behind Astana, who had won six titles in a row. Then in my second season, in 2020, we became champions for the first time in 16 years. 

It was not so easy in the beginning because the coaches before had played the ball-holding Spanish style – only ball possession, without a target. The transition phases were really low, so we had to adjust that and show them that football is a picture of all the phases.

In 2021, a few weeks before we were due to play a Champions League qualification game, I got an offer from Erzgebirge Aue in the 2. Bundesliga. I always dreamt about being a head coach in either England or Germany. I told myself that if I got the chance I would go, even for a lower salary.

“Like Brentford, he works with metrics, scouting players in this way”

The Aue president promised that I could build a high-intensity style of football, bringing in young players. I signed for three years, but there were some difficulties, not least that we couldn’t sign the players I wanted to fit my style.

After the first training session, I said to my father it could be really difficult for me here, because I moved without my assistant coaches. I had to convince the club to bring at least one of my staff, which happened after some weeks, but we got almost no time before they made a decision to change.

Now I can see that this experience was a chance to grow as a coach. And if someone understands football, they would see the difficult situation I had there. I hadn’t become a bad coach, but in my next role it was important for me to show what I was capable of.

When I was at Kairat, the owner of Aris Limassol in Cyprus had asked me if I would come and help get promotion to the first division. I said thank you, but I could not imagine working in the second division in Cyprus at that stage of my career.

They were promoted in 2021. Then, in February 2022, he invited me and my wife to come and see what it was like. He booked a very nice hotel room with a view of the sea, and my wife said to me: “My darling, it is so beautiful here, we have to stay!” To which I could only say: “Give me a chance to speak with the president.”

As it turned out, I really liked his way of thinking. He’s also very young – a couple of years older than me – and likes to implement new things. Like Brentford he works with metrics, scouting players in this way, but also scouting me as a coach. He had been observing me with data as well as in real life. That meant he understood I could develop players, which fitted with his targets of winning games and also selling players.

“I was really proud that we did it playing our way”

In the first year we qualified for Europe for the first time in the club’s history. In the second year – after we had adjusted with some new signings – we became champions. It was like a fairytale – the first time the club had been champions since being founded in 1930. 

Everything grew so fast that we didn’t have a real base. We only had a football pitch, a small dressing room, and small gym that we built by taking out a cafeteria. It was with these conditions that we played in the group stage of the Europa League.

We had done well in the Champions League qualifying rounds, beating BATE Borisov, then narrowly losing to Raków Czestochowa. Then we got an amazing draw in the Europa League, with Real Betis, Sparta Prague and Rangers.

When you are the underdog, you need a clear match plan. You have to make the players believe in the way you play. And the most important thing for me was that we should never be afraid. Home or away, it should not matter against which opponent we play. In five out of the six games we played in that group, it was 50-50. Rangers won the group, but we beat them at home and drew 1-1 away, after taking the lead at Ibrox.

I was really proud that we did it playing our way. And it was amazing to hear feedback from fans, owners and sporting directors, who were impressed to see a relatively small club from Cyprus play in this way.

I am very thankful for the chance that the owner of Aris Limassol gave to me. Now the time is right for me to take the next step. What is most important is that in my next role I have the belief and conviction that the club really wants me. That they will give me the time to build something unique. To grow the players, the team and the club, with modern, energetic coaching.