Russia’s volleyball coach commits suicide after Olympic failure – report

Russian women’s volleyball squad head coach, Sergey Ovchinnikov (RIA Novosti/Vladimir Pesnya)

TAGS: Volleyball

The All-Russian Volleyball Federation says the women’s national team coach, Sergey Ovchinnikov has died. It’s reported he apparently committing suicide.

43-year-old Ovchinnikov was at the training camp in Croatia with his team Dynamo Moscow.

The former Russian coach Vladimir Kuzyutkin says the suicide could have been due to the poor showing of the women’s team at the London Olympics.

"This is so stupid,” he told RSN. “He was my friend, my colleague. No one said a bad word about him. Yes, there was a blunder at the Olympics, well, to hell with it. I don’t know why he couldn’t cope with it.”

The head coach of the men's volleyball team, Vladimir Alekno, confirmed that the London failure was a huge blow for Ovchinnikov.

“He took the Olympics very personally,” he said. “I saw what he was going through and how upset he was after the defeat. He didn’t talk much. Even after victories he was always thinking about something and smoked a lot."

Russian women’s volleyball squad entered the London Games as one of the favorites, but missed out on medals, losing to Brazil in the quarterfinals.

Ovchinnikov led the country’s student squad to bronze at the 2011 Universiade and was assigned as national team’s coach the same year.

Under him, Russia booked a spot at the London Games, snatching first spot in the world qualifiers.

Dynamo Moscow head coach Sergei Ovchinnikov during the third match of the final series of the Women's Volleyball Super League between VC Dynamo Moscow and VC Dynamo Kazan. (RIA Novosti/Vladimir Pesnya)

Head coach of volleyball club "Dynamo" (Krasnodar) Sergei Ovchinnikov and team players Daria Vekshina and Elena Konstantinova (from left) during a break in the Cup of Russia semifinal volleyball match between women's clubs "Dynamo" (Kazan) and VC "Dynamo" (Krasnodar). (RIA Novosti/Ramil Sitdikov)