Valin, who is part of Girgen’s team, does not have the appropriate qualification for the position of LFF sports director / Diena

Already this Friday, the presidential elections of the LFF will take place, with two candidates for the position of the head of the organization – the president of the Latvian Indoor Football Association (LTFA) Vadim Lashenko and the Minister of the Interior of the Republic of Latvia Sandis Girgen (KPV LV).

Lashenko nominated 103 of the 137 members of the federation, but Gürgen’s application was initially declared ineligible, only after the decision of the LFF Board of Appeal was approved. Lashenko has already named the full board, which he would like to see in his team, but Girgens announced at the end of last week the first two members of his future team – if he is elected LFF president, the interior minister has committed to attract former Latvian national team defender Juris Laizans. the current goalkeeper of the state unit Andris Vanins could take the position.

However, Vanins does not qualify for the position of LFF sports director, according to the job description at the disposal of Diena.lv, developed by the International Association of Football Federations (FIFA).

It stipulates that the sports director must have extensive knowledge of national football, be a former player, have experience as a coach, have a top-class coaching diploma, have knowledge of football education and a number of other skills.

The highest in Latvia is Pro UEFA category coach license, followed by A-UEFA, B-UEFA and C-LFF licenses. However, Vanin, a candidate for the position of sports director, is currently studying to obtain a license in the lower or C-LFF category, the goalkeeper revealed in an interview with the magazine Sports Newspaper July issue, which will be released this week.

“After sitting at home for two months, I started studying for the Latvian Football Federation coaches category C. Cool, I like it! I learn a lot of interesting things. At the same time I study as a goalkeeper coach. The training will take place until August and the diploma will be in my pocket,” The team said Vanin, saying that the resumption of football season after the pandemic crisis will make it harder for him to learn a license, he may have to skip some sessions, but the federation will still send homework and videos, which the player is committed to learning. “As an active footballer, I didn’t have time to learn, although I wanted to do it a long time ago. In the last couple of months, it has appeared and I realized that I have to learn.”

From December 2012 to the beginning of this year, the position of LFF Sports Director was held by Dainis Kazakevičs, who is currently confirmed as the head coach of the national team. When Kazakevich left office, minor changes were made to the job description of the sports director.

As a week and a half ago in a video interview on the site Delphi explained LFF Secretary General Edgars Pukinsks, currently a national teams department headed by the men’s national team coach to ensure the implementation and supervision of the football philosophy in the full pyramid from the national team to children’s and youth football, but the sports director will be the head of the football department women’s football and coaching education. As Pukinsky revealed at the time, the main candidate for the position of sports director has been Yuri Andreev, who is currently the head of the Education Department, but the Covid-19 crisis dragged the talks with him for three months.