In the future, the wrestling association will move to the model of one head coach. Juha Lappalainen plans to apply for laundry. Executive Director Pasi Sarkkinen applied for a job at the Olympic Committee.
Two wrestlers represented Finland at the Olympic Games in Paris. Jonni Sarkkinen mixed Arvi Savolainen the competition ended up being a total of three matches.
Paniliitto, the umbrella organization of the traditional Finnish sport, has prepared a major change, which will be implemented at the Olympics that will begin immediately and culminate in the Los Angeles Games in 2028.
– We have had a model of two head coaches, where Juha Lappalainen was responsible for Greco-Roman wrestling and Niko Kettunen about men’s and women’s freestyle wrestling, says the Executive Director of Painiliitto Pasi SarkkinenJonni Sarkkinen’s father.
After the Olympic Games, the Painiliito is also on the hunt again for coaching positions, but now there is only one head coaching position available.
– In the future one head coach is responsible for the union government’s wish for the entire process, says Sarkkinen.
The executive director says that Painiliitto is also reacting to the government’s clear will to reduce the paid staff of sports organizations. For the current year, Paniliitto received 311,000 euros in state aid distributed by the Ministry of Education and Culture, and in addition more than 100,000 euros in support of the Olympic Committee’s elite sports unit. The wrestling association has three permanent and two temporary employees.
– There is no information about future support levels.
Lappalainen applying for an extension
Juha Lappalainen, who has been the national team and head coach of Greco-Roman wrestling for more than a decade, told Urheilu on Monday that he is very likely to apply for the job of head coach.
– Of course, the head coach’s new job description is interesting, because it will certainly change a bit, Lappalainen, who works first and foremost with athletes on the wrestling mat, said.
Elected as executive director of the Wrestling Association in 2021, Sarkkinen admits that he has applied to the Olympic Committee for a job where his duties would be primarily related to the environmental work of Finnish elite sports. A top sports director who left the committee Matti Heikkinen Sarkkinen is not applying to succeed him. Before joining the Wrestling Federation, he worked for eight years in the Olympic Committee’s elite sports unit as a martial arts manager, but this kind of job description no longer exists in the renewed unit.
– I have applied for a job at the Olympic Committee, but it has been a while. The vacancy has not been filled, but now it seems that recruitment in the committee will only move once a new top sports director has been selected. So it will probably go into next year.
At the end of November, the new board of trustees of the Olympic Committee announced that it will transfer the recruitment of Heikkinen’s successor to the new board.
Although Finland is the last has consistently achieved medals in wrestling, from the previous Olympic medal, national team coach Marko Yli-Hannuskelan of silver, turned 20 years old this summer.
– There is gratifying information about the current top group of the national team in the sense that no one is obviously about to quit. Elias Kuosmanen was the biggest question mark. He suffered from motivational problems, but has most obviously overcome them, says Sarkkinen.
Helsingin Haka organized the WC championships at the weekend, where Kuosmanen, representing the host club, looked for something else: another EC medalist Konsta Mäenpään In the final match of the 130 kg.