2015 Pan American Games: Foreign Coaches Help Brazil Win Medals for the First Time

07/20/2015 - 09h34

The future of foreign coaches hired by the Brazilian Olympic Committee (COB), a bet to achieve the goals at the 2015 Pan American Games in Toronto, Canada, and at the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, is undecided for the period following 2016.

All the contracts will expire at the end of the next year and the committee doesn't know which coaches will continue. If it decides to hold some of them, the committee is likely to have trouble keeping them.

In Toronto for example, 38 foreign coaches paid by the COB helped teams in events of little tradition in Brazil - such as water polo, canoeing and badminton - reach historic podium results.

Aside from the record, the number of foreigners represents an increase of some 60% in comparison with the Pan American Games held in Guadalajara in 2011 (24). Most of them receive high salaries.

One of them is Croatia's Ratko Rudic, 67, four-time Olympic gold medalist brought in 2013. He led the Brazilian men's water polo team to the silver medal in Toronto - the team also reached the third place in the World League for the first time this season.

Given the importance of the work done by people like Rudic, the COB is hurrying to guarantee that some of them will stay and ensure that the athletes' competitiveness will be extended beyond the Olympics.

The problem is that, in many cases, the situation escapes the control of COB for a variety of reasons.

Jorge Bichara, COB's general manger of performance, cited the case of Vladimir Vatkin, of Belarus, who was the coach of the men's gymnastics team and left his position last year for a personal reason - his wife didn't adapt to Brazil.

The same occurs in other cases. Chris Neill, of New Zealand, has been the coach of the women's rugby team and formed the team that obtained a bronze medal in Toronto, but said that he doesn't intend to continue in the position after the 2016 Olympic Games.

With five children, he wants to return to his country. "I was hired for the 2016 project. After that, it's good to get some new ideas. A coach's job is lonely. I want to go back to my family," he says.

Marco Vasconcellos, the Portuguese coach who helped Brazil win two silver medals in the Pan American Games for the first time, also intends to leave Campinas, where he has lived since 2014, and cross the ocean back to Lisbon.

"Although I can use Skype, I miss my children. And other challenges will come," he said.

Translated by THOMAS MUELLO

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	Theo Marques-03.mai.2013/Folhapress
	Coach Oleg Ostapenko, from Ukraine