Oleg Blokhin


Oleg Vladimirovich Blokhin, or Oleh Volodymyrovych Blokhin, is a Ukrainian former football player and manager. Regarded as one of the greatest footballers of his generation, Blokhin was a standout striker for Dynamo Kyiv and the [Soviet Union national association football|football team|Soviet Union].
He holds the all-time top goalscorer record for both Dynamo Kiev and the Soviet Union national team, as well as being the overall top goalscorer in the history of the Soviet Top League. He is also the only player to have been capped over 100 times for the Soviet Union and holds Dynamo's appearance record with 582 appearances during his 18-year spell at the club. With Dynamo, Blokhin won eight Soviet league titles, five national cups and two European Cup Winners' Cups. He also competed for the Soviet Union at the [Football at the Football at the 1972 Summer Olympics|1972 Summer Olympics|1972] and [Football at the Football at the 1976 Summer Olympics|1976 Summer Olympics|1976] Olympic Games and 1982 and 1986 FIFA World Cups. During his playing career he won the Soviet Footballer of the Year award three times and the Ukrainian Footballer of the Year award nine times. In 1975, he was named European Footballer of the Year, winning the Ballon d'Or, becoming the second Soviet and the first Ukrainian player to achieve such a feat.
As a coach, he has had two spells in charge of the Ukraine national team, managing the team at the 2006 FIFA World Cup and UEFA Euro 2012.
In 2011, Blokhin, together with Igor Belanov and Vitaliy Starukhin were named as "the legends of Ukrainian football" at the Victory of Football awards.

Early life

Blokhin was born in Kyiv, the capital of the Ukrainian SSR, in 1952. His mother Kateryna Adamenko was multiple champion of USSR in the pentathlon, sprint and long jump. He was born to a Russian father and Ukrainian mother. His father Vladimir Blokhin was a police officer, a World War II veteran, and a competitive sprinter. Owing to his parents, Blokhin quickly mastered sprint, and by the age of 16 ran 60 m in less than 7 seconds, and 100 m in 11.0 seconds.

Playing career

Blokhin was one of the greatest players in the world throughout the 1970s, hitting the target regularly through a period of great success at his hometown club Dynamo Kyiv and becoming the greatest goalscorer in the history of the Soviet League, which was one of Europe's strongest. Normally a forward or winger, Blokhin was most renowned for possessing exceptional pace.
Blokhin played during most of his career for Dynamo Kyiv, becoming the USSR national championship's all-time leader and goalscorer with 211 goals, as well as making more appearances than any other player with 432 appearances. He won the championship 8 times. He led Dynamo to the UEFA Cup Winners' Cup in 1975 and 1986, scoring a goal in each final. Blokhin is also the USSR national football team's most capped player with 112 caps, as well as their all-time leading goalscorer with 42 goals; he played in the 1982 and 1986 FIFA World Cups where he scored one goal in each. He was one of the first Soviet players to play abroad, signing for Austria's Vorwärts Steyr in 1988, he also played in Cyprus with Aris.
In 1979 Blokhin played a couple of games for Ukraine at the Spartakiad of the Peoples of the USSR.

Managerial career

After retiring as a player, Blokhin coached Greek clubs Olympiacos, PAOK, AEK Athens, and Ionikos.
He began serving as the head coach of the Ukraine national team in September 2003. Under his leadership, Ukraine qualified for a major tournament for the first time as an independent nation, reaching the 2006 FIFA World Cup in Germany. Ukraine reached the quarter-finals of the tournament, losing to eventual champions Italy. Following the side's failure to reach UEFA Euro 2008, Blokhin stepped down as coach on 6 December 2007.
On 14 December 2007, he was named head coach of FC Moscow. The club finished 9th and after the season ended Blokhin was fired from the club. At the end of the season, Blokhin announced that if he knew how things would go in FC Moscow, he would have never signed there. This was because the club released many important players without Blokhin's permission yet still had many high expectations. Others said that the reason Blokhin failed in FC Moscow was that he and the press didn't have a friendly relationship, and because of that the press was constantly attacking Blokhin and that damaged his status among the players.
On 21 April 2011, Blokhin was again appointed head coach of the Ukraine national team. He led the team in UEFA Euro 2012 on home soil, beating Sweden but exiting at the group stage after defeats to France and England.
[file:Pressekonferenz nach dem Fußballländerspiel Österreich-Ukraine (01.06.2012) Oleh Blochin1.jpg|thumb|Blokhin in 2012]
On 25 September 2012, Dynamo Kyiv signed Blokhin to lead the club for the next four years. His final matches in charge of Ukraine were World Cup qualifiers against Moldova and Montenegro in October 2012. Blokhin was dismissed as Dynamo's manager by the club's President Ihor Surkis on 17 April 2014 because of the "unsatisfactory results of the team". The day before, in a press conference after Dynamo had lost a match against Shakhtar Donetsk, Blokhin had already stated that he had decided to resign. Under his leadership Dynamo never qualified for the UEFA Champions League and performed poorly in the UEFA Europa League. In his first year his team finished third in the Ukrainian Premier League and in his second year Dynamo was seven points behind Ukrainian Premier League leaders Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk and Shakhtar Donetsk.

Politics

In 1998 Blokhin was elected to Verkhovna Rada for Hromada. He joined Hromada while still being a member of the Communist Party of Ukraine. In March 2002, Blokhin was elected to Verkhovna Rada for a second term. In October 2002, he joined the United Social Democratic Party of Ukraine.

Family

Blokhin's father, Vladimir Blokhin, is a native of Moscow, a veteran of the World War II, survivor of the Leningrad blockade, and a former Soviet law enforcement agent. He later worked as a sports functionary for the republican Dynamo Society, which is related to law enforcement and the state security forces. Blokhin's mother Kateryna Adamenko is from Nebrat village in Borodianka Raion, Kyiv Oblast. She originally worked at a Kyiv sewing factory, but eventually discovered hidden athletic talents and became the Soviet champion in track and field as well as pentathlon. After retiring from sports, she became a staff member at one of Kyiv's universities.
Blokhin was married to Irina Deriugina, a top coach and former world champion in rhythmic gymnastics, but the couple divorced in the early 1990s. Blokhin and Deriugina have a daughter, singer Iryna Blokhina, who wrote and performed the Euro 2012 anthem.
Blokhin and his second wife, Angela, have two daughters, Hanna and Katerina.

Career statistics

Club

  • The statistics in USSR Cups and Europe is made under the scheme "autumn-spring" and enlisted in a year of start of tournaments

International

No.DateVenueOpponentScoreResultCompetition
116 07 1972Helsinki Olympic Stadium, Helsinki, Finland1–01–1Friendly
206 08 1972Råsunda Stadion, Stockholm, Sweden4–34–4Friendly
31972-09-01Jahnstadion, Regensburg, West Germany1–04–11972 Olympics
41972-09-01Jahnstadion, Regensburg, West Germany2–04–11972 Olympics
51972-09-01Jahnstadion, Regensburg, West Germany3–04–11972 Olympics
605 09 1972Rosenaustadion, Augsburg, West Germany1–01–21972 Olympics
708 09 1972Rosenaustadion, Augsburg, West Germany3–04–01972 Olympics
810 09 1972Olympic Stadium, Munich, West Germany1–02–21972 Olympics
926 05 1973Central Lenin Stadium, Moscow, Soviet Union1–02–01972 FIFA World Cup qualification
1002 04 1975Kyiv Central Stadium, Kyiv, Soviet Union3–03–0UEFA Euro 1976 qualification
1118 05 1975Kyiv Central Stadium, Kyiv, Soviet Union1–02–1UEFA Euro 1976 qualification
1210 03 1976Všešportový areál, Košice, Czechoslovakia1–02–2Friendly
1324 03 1976Vasil Levski National Stadium, Sofia, Bulgaria3–03–0Friendly
1422 05 1976Kyiv Central Stadium, Kyiv2–22–2UEFA Euro 1976 qualification
1523 07 1976Lansdowne Park, Ottawa, Canada3–03–01976 Olympics
161977-03-23JNA Stadium, Belgrade, Yugoslavia1–04–2Friendly
171977-03-23JNA Stadium, Belgrade, Yugoslavia3–14–2Friendly
181977-09-07Central Stadium, Volgograd, Soviet Union3–14–1Friendly
191977-09-07Central Stadium, Volgograd, Soviet Union4–14–1Friendly
2026 02 1978Stade El Harti, Marrakesh, Morocco1–13–2Friendly
211978-04-05Hrazdan Stadium, Yerevan, Soviet Union4–010–2Friendly
221978-04-05Hrazdan Stadium, Yerevan, Soviet Union6–010–2Friendly
231978-04-05Hrazdan Stadium, Yerevan, Soviet Union9–110–2Friendly
2414 05 1978Stadionul 23 August, Bucharest, Romania1–01–0Friendly
2505 10 1978Ankara 19 Mayıs Stadium, Ankara, Turkey2–02–0Friendly
2628 03 1979Lokomotiv Stadium, Simferopol, Soviet Union1–03–1Friendly
2727 08 1980Népstadion, Budapest, Hungary1–14–1Friendly
2823 09 1981Central Lenin Stadium, Moscow3–04–01982 FIFA World Cup qualification
291981-10-07İzmir Atatürk Stadium, İzmir, Turkey2–03–01982 World Cup qualification
301981-10-07İzmir Atatürk Stadium, İzmir, Turkey3–03–01982 World Cup qualification
3118 11 1981Dinamo Stadium, Tbilisi, Soviet Union2–03–01982 World Cup qualification
3229 11 1981Tehelné pole, Bratislava, Czechoslovakia1–01–11982 World Cup qualification
3303 06 1982Råsunda Stadion, Stockholm, Sweden1–01–1Friendly
3419 06 1982Estadio La Rosaleda, Málaga, Spain2–03–01982 FIFA World Cup
3513 04 1983Stade Olympique de la Pontaise, Lausanne, Switzerland1–01–0Friendly
3617 05 1983Praterstadion, Vienna, Austria2–12–2Friendly
3701 06 1983Helsinki Olympic Stadium, Helsinki, Finland1–01–0UEFA Euro 1984 qualification
3826 07 1983Zentralstadion, Leipzig, East Germany1–03–1Friendly
3909 10 1983Central Lenin Stadium, Moscow, Soviet Union2–02–0UEFA Euro 1984 qualification
4019 08 1984Kirov Stadium, Leningrad, Soviet Union3–03–0Friendly
4109 06 1986Estadio Sergio León Chavez, Irapuato, Mexico1–02–01986 FIFA World Cup
4229 10 1986Lokomotiv Stadium, Simferopol, Soviet Union3–03–0UEFA Euro 1988 qualification

Honours

Dynamo Kyiv
Individual
Ballon d'Or'