Former Volyn head coach Vitalii Kvartsianyi spoke about his work with Yaroslav Kinash.
Vitaly Kvartsyanyi
- Who was your most talented Ukrainian player who failed to reach his full potential?
- Yaroslav Kinash. In Ukrainian football, there are few players who have non-standard coordination and a sense of the moment, while telling their partners what to do next. Kinash is a footballer from God.
- How did you find him?
- My agent Kulishevych, who used to play for me in Volyn, brought him to me. He found him in the regional championship: "Volodymyr, look at the player".
FC Volyn was going to a training camp in Yevpatoria in January, it had already snowed. I was travelling from Kyiv to Kovel by train and told the coaches, Volodymyr Zhuravchak, Stepan Pavlov, Vova Dykyi, to look at Kinash while I was away. They called me: "It's hard to see anything, there's snow up to the knees".
I arrived and did a workout in the morning at the sports school gym, because we had a train to Crimea at 10am. I had to figure out whether to take Kinash to the training camp or not. I divided the players into fives to play mini-football. After 30 minutes of play, I immediately said: "Kinash is coming with us".
- How did he perform at the training camp?
- Terrible! He didn't want to get up in the morning at all, didn't want to run or jump. In general, a difficult footballer! I also thought: "What a freak! He's more difficult by nature than Brazilians and Serbs combined." I remembered one story.
- Well, tell it, I feel it will be interesting.
- On the third day of the training camp, we play against Kharkiv Helios. I think I'll watch Kinash in the game. I put him under the striker and gave him instructions: "Slavik, pick up, play the game, play more with the ball. Don't be afraid to work hard, pass it, see how best to pass it, whether it's a cross or not."
In the first half, we were 2-1 up, but eventually lost 2-4. After the game, we washed up, had dinner and I said: "We'll sleep later, we'll analyse the game straight away! How could we play like that and lose a winning game?" Kinashu made a personal complaint: "Young man, why did you play like that? You run forward and walk backwards. If you keep playing like that, you'll go home."
And he said to me: "Fuck you and your football, I'm going home".
- Wow. What did you do?
- I was scared, but not because of what he said, but because he was a f***ing prick. The guy was talented, I didn't want to lose him. I tried to pin him down right away, as I usually do, but I probably overreacted. I had to save the situation! I quickly finished the analysis and let everyone rest.
I told my coaches: "Go and calm this jerk down. At the very least, take his passport and don't let him go anywhere. He is a unique footballer, we cannot lose him."
They left and returned 15 minutes later: "Volodymyrovych, he sent us too, he wants to leave. He won't give us his passport". I said: "Lock him up in a room, tie his hands, take his passport and belongings, and let him sit there until he gets hungry and starts knocking." They locked him up. In the evening, we let Kinash out for dinner, and he still stood his ground: "I'm not going to play here, fuck you all, I'm going home." I thought, yo, I've done something wrong. I saw a zest in him, but I didn't know he would react like that.
- How did you persuade him to stay?
- I'm not a dude either, and sometimes I apologised to the players, I told him: "Son, I'm sorry. I liked you and I want you to play in my team." In short, I made him sour a little bit.
Then I told Stolyar: "Vasya, talk to him like a president, Kinash will listen to you". He is a very sincere person, a man with a capital M, he has never read morals to footballers or fined them. Stolyar picked up the phone, said something to him, and Kinash replied: "I don't care whether you are the president or not, if I want to leave, I will". In short, he sent Stolyar away culturally.
We all had to work hard for Kinash to stay: his passport was taken away, his belongings were taken away. It was snowing in Simferopol, where would he go? We still managed to persuade him to stay. I sent coaches to the market: "Buy Kinash some bananas, oranges and Pepsi Cola, he loves it." A few days later, he wiped himself down, he liked everything.
As a result, he started to play very well, and when we reached the Major League, he was a masterpiece.
Andrii Piskun
