On the eve, he learned about the possible departure of Ashot Khachaturyants from the post of head of the RPL. as reported “Championship” Citing two sources, the officer sees no hope of continuing his activities in this position.
“Due to the current situation, Khachaturyants does not see a future in his status as head of the RPL,” the message states.
It was stated that Khachaturyants, who is also chairman of the RFU’s Referee Committee (SC), will focus specifically on refereeing issues. It is claimed that this is the most important for him.
Introducing Fan ID and expanding RPL
Khachaturyants took office as President of the RPL in November 2021, presenting a strategic development concept that includes support for clubs in crisis conditions, plans to change the format of the foreign player cap, and the introduction of a Fan ID.
In addition, he announced his intention to expand the RPL to 18 teams, but admitted in March 2022 that his motivation to continue working against the background of sanctions on Russian sports has waned and “80% of the concept has become better”. irrelevant.”
However, the issue of expanding the league is still being discussed in football circles, and Khachaturyants’ support for the Fan ID law did not add to the love of the fans. So, to congratulate Zenit on winning the championship ahead of schedule, the head of the RPL went to St. Petersburg, but he couldn’t even finish his speech – fans booed the official as he chanted slogans against Fan ID. Recall that when it became known that the “Fan ID” law was approved, the supporters’ associations of RPL clubs announced that they would boycott their teams’ matches.
Judge Wars
In recent months, refereeing has continued to be the main subject of Khachaturyants’ public matches. The official made it clear from the very beginning that he intends to work hard with referees who score poorly in matches, and he kept this promise – some referees received suspensions and penalties during their work. He had a correspondence battle with referee Alexei Matyunin.
In the 26th round match between Khimki and Wings of the Soviets (4: 1), referee Matyunin called the head of the RPL “ugly”, and in response the referee said that he had filed a complaint with the RFU about Khachaturyants. .
At the same time, the expert evaluation commission of the Russian Football Union (ESK RFU) decided that Matyunin made a two-goal mistake in favor of Khimki, scoring a false penalty to Krylia in the 42nd minute and counting the goal of the Moscow Region team. at the 50th minute. “RB Sports” He claims that the referee passed a polygraph test after this game – Khachaturyants in an interview with the publication avoided discussing this issue, but noted that in connection with his work, Matyunin intended to communicate with law enforcement agencies.
“Yes, we are planning to turn to law enforcement as we have enough doubts about an impartial and impartial arbitration and the RFU as a public agency has exhausted its possibilities to take further action on this matter. We believe that law enforcement will resolve this situation,” Khachaturyants said.
It is noteworthy that in the same interview, he also stated that he plans to leave leadership positions at ESC and RFU IC. Khachaturyants stressed that he would only consolidate positions until the end of the current RPL draw, but did not talk about his future as league president.
“Because of all the problems there is”
Repeatedly this season, representatives of various RPL clubs have expressed their dissatisfaction with the work of the referees. In particular, allegations have been made in connection with the controversial interpretation of decisions when using the video assist (VAR) system for referees. According to Maxim Demenko, the former midfielder of Spartak and the Russian national team, the main problem that gives the referees, clubs and leaders of Russian football a headache are the errors in working with VAR.
“Perhaps the talk about the departure of Khachaturyants is fake. But there is no smoke without fire. Perhaps this is because there are conflicts in the judiciary at the moment. The situation is probably not improving and the clubs are putting pressure.
We’ve seen Ashot Khachaturyants tackle their refereeing issues as hard as they can, but it looks like there’s a lot of pressure on them.
Now we are still adapting to VAR, some points are interpreted differently. And we see this problem not only in the Russian championship, but also in the Champions League at the highest level. If Khachaturyants is replaced, they will face the same problems and a leap forward: The pressure will continue and we will not finally reach a common denominator.
In any case, there will be referee mistakes, this is inevitable. Of course, at the end of the work, it would be good for experts to evaluate the judgment.
But the question is different: The whole problem stems from VAR. Let alone the human factor, look at the interpretation of the violations that even the VAR could not identify. The big clubs started to complain, the pressure continued.
If a decision is made to use a VAR, there needs to be a clear understanding of the violations. Then they start calculating where half of the elbow is offside, where a hand is touching. It should be clear what constitutes a foul and when a penalty is awarded. These subtleties of judgment create problems for leaders.
If we talk about Ashot Khachaturyants, he coped, dismissed the judges, there were purges. “But if we lose all the judges with extensive experience, we will never get out of this situation and bigger problems will begin,” he said.
Who can replace Khachaturyants?
Currently, there is no official confirmation of information regarding the departure of Ashot Khachaturyants from the post of head of RPL. Accordingly, it is not known for certain who could replace him in this position. According to media reports, one of the candidates is Akhmat Aidamirov – general manager of Akhmat – but refused to comment on this issue and stated that Khachaturyants is currently the head of RPL and there is no point in discussing it.