A photo of Qarabag head coach Qurban Qurbanov from 17 years ago has gone viral on social media.
Idman.Biz reports that in the 13th round of the Azerbaijan Premier League, Qarabag’s 2-0 win over Karvan-Yevlakh marked Qurbanov’s 800th match as the club’s head coach.
To commemorate the occasion, social networks have shared a photo from an interview Qurbanov gave to Futbol+gol newspaper when he first signed with Qarabag. At that time, the article’s headline read: “Qurban Qurbanov Did Not Promise a Championship.”
Since taking charge of the team in 2008, Qurbanov has led Qarabag to 10 national championships, one silver and two bronze medals, as well as six national cups. Under his guidance, the club has reached the group stage of European competitions 12 times and qualified twice for the UEFA Champions League group stage.
Speaking at a press conference about his 800th match, the experienced coach remained humble: “I don’t calculate these numbers myself. If it’s a successful statistic, that’s pleasing. Every coach dreams of such a career. If I have completed 200–300 successful matches, I hope to reach 1,000 as well.”
