Alexander Starkov is a former Soviet football player, and now a Latvian coach, who is now coaching the Latvian national football team. He is 61 years old, so in the near future he will probably end his professional career as a coach so as not to overload his health too much. Alexander Starkov acted as a striker when he was still a player.
Carier start
Alexander Starkov was born on July 26, 1955 in the city of Madona, located in the Latvian SSR. There he began to play football and joined the football academy of the local RPI club, with whom in 1973 he entered into a professional contract for reaching adulthood. In "FIR" he spent only two years, after which he moved to the "Daugava", with which most of his career will be connected. In 1976, Starkov had already played 24 matches for the new club, but spent only one more year there before he was invited to the Dynamo Moscow. However, Alexander Starkov did not stay there and already in the same year he returned back to the club, where he would play for a very long time.
Player career in the Daugava
So, Alexander Petrovich Starkov returned to the Daugava in 1978, when he was 23 years old so as not to leave this club anymore. There he spent the whole twelve years of his career, and in 1990 announced that he was leaving the sport. During these 12 years, the footballer managed to do a lot for the club - he went onto the field 417 times, scoring 189 goals. His best season was in 1985, when he scored 28 goals in 46 games. For his services to the club and to the country, he was recognized as the best player in Latvia for the whole fifty years - from 1953 to 2003. Naturally, he was not going to finish on what he had achieved: Alexander Petrovich Starkov already received a coaching license at the age of 35, and when he announced that he was completing his football career, he was immediately informed that he would become a new coach "Daugava".
The beginning of a coaching career
Alexander Starkov was already a coach at the age of 35. It sounded very impressive, but the club's coach, who acted at that time, showed too good results to replace him. Therefore, Starkov took the position of his assistant, where he stayed for two years. When he realized that there was nothing to wait for him in the Daugava, he accepted the offer from the Football Union of Latvia and headed the country's youth team in the age category under 21 years old. He trained her for one year and showed that he was capable of much. That is why in 1993 he received an offer from the Riga club "Skonto", which he led.
Success with Skonto
Starkov the footballer has done a lot for Latvia. In particular, it is about what he gave to his club. "Daugava" (Riga) never before Starkov and never after him knew such an incredible striker. However, not always a successful football player turns into a successful coach. Fortunately, in the case of Alexander Petrovich, everything turned out very well. In 1993, he headed Skonto and immediately won the Latvian championship with the club. For twelve years, Starkov headed Skonto, and the club won the Latvian championship twelve times. In addition, six times he managed to take the Latvian Cup as well, twice he won the Livonia Cup. And almost all this time, Starkov simultaneously played the role of assistant coach in the national team of Latvia. He was invited there in 1995, and he left only in 2001. During this time, he managed to work with five different coaches, but none of them could bring the team to a new level. In 2001, Starkov tried himself as the head coach of the national team, still combining this activity with the coaching work at Skonto, and in 2004, when he left the club, he left the national team.
The period in Spartak
Alexander Starkov left Skonto and the Latvian national team for a reason - he was offered a job in the Russian Spartak, a team that was one of the strongest during the Soviet Union. But now the club was far from so intimidating, and the management hoped that the new coach could breathe new life into him. Unfortunately, the expectations did not come true - Starkov, of course, managed to finish the Russian championship in second place in 2005, and in 2006 to lead the club to the semifinal of the Russian Cup, this was clearly not enough for the leadership. Therefore, after only two years at the club, Starkov returned to his homeland.
Return to Latvia
In March 2007, Alexander Starkov accepted the proposal of the Latvian Football Union and again headed the national team of the country. He coped well, showed not the worst results, but could not achieve anything that no one had achieved before him. For all the time at the helm Stark could not get a single impressive victory, defeating only Luxembourg, Malta and other similar teams. And in 2013, when in four games he was able to draw only two times and lost twice, and then was defeated by Bosnia and Herzegovina 0-5, Starkov resigned as a coach.
However, in 2009, while he was still working in the national team, he was again invited by Riga Skonto, which he led to 12 of 12 victories in the Latvian championship in the past. This time it was not possible to win: in 2009, Starkov was able to get Skonto out of the crisis only in third place, and the next time he helped the club win the Baltic League and reach the Livonia Cup final.
After that, Starkov headed the Azerbaijani “Baku”, with which he worked for a year and a half. When he first left Baku and then the Latvian national team, many believed that he would leave the sport. But after a three-year hiatus, Starkov returned to assist the new coach of the Latvian national team, Marjan Pahari, with whom he had already worked nine games.