Russian Federation of Ice-Hockey attesting committee had a meeting in Moscow, Russia. Qualifying tests were validated at the meeting and coaches were given national categories. The coaches were testes as part of coaching seminar organized by Junior Hockey League during Your Chance program for young players at Sirius Educational Center in Sochi, Russia.

JHC Dynamo Moscow head-coach Yaroslav Lyuzenkov was given the highest category. In the 2020-21 season Lyuzenkov led JHC Dynamo Moscow to the first Kharlamov Cup in franchise history and was named the top coach of Junior Hockey League.

Eduard Timashev was also given the highest category – the coach will be Rustem Kamaletdinov’s assistant at Russkie Vityazi Moscow Region.

First category was given to four coaches, who were appointed head-coaches this off-season – Viktor Gordiyuk (Taifun Primorie Region), Dmitry Kramarenko (Sakhalinskie Akuly Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk), Konstantin Panov (Belye Medvedi Chelyabinsk) and Andrei Shefer (Almaz Cherepovets).

Second category was also given to Irbis Kazan assistant coach Alexei Yermolayev as well as HC Kapitan Stupino assistant coaches Pavel Pushkaryov and Dmitry Kulyabov.

As of the 2020-21 season, according to Junior Hockey League development strategy, head-coaches require national coaching category of level no lower than first, while other coaches must have national coaching category no lower than third.

Alexander Guskov, Kontinental Hockey League junior hockey development vice-president.

“I would like to congratulate the coaches on their successful attainment of national coaching categories. I wish them further improvement at first in Junior Hockey League and then in men’s hockey leagues,” said Alexander Guskov. “I believe, the league fine-tuned the process of development not just for the players but also for the coaches. In the league development strategy from 2018 to 2023 we saw that the lack of requirements for coaches’ qualification needed to be addressed. We have warned the clubs well ahead of time and set the rules. Head-coaches now require national coaching category of level no lower than first, while other coaches must have national coaching category of level no lower than third. However, Junior Hockey League not simply demand but helps coaches to develop. This June we had a coaching seminar and we received positive feedback from participants. We were lucky with our speakers. The topics discussed were so up-to-date that the round table discussion lasted for several hours. Coaches constantly move up club verticals. It was just recently that Alexei Zavarukhin, who was at the helm of Belye Medvedi [Chelyabinsk] and led the team to third place in the East, joined Traktor coaching staff. HK Riga head-coach Valery Kulibaba was hired as Sergei Zubov’s assistant at Dinamo Riga.”