Sergei Baltacha (footballer, born 1958)

Sergei Pavlovich Baltacha (Сергій Павлович Балтача; born 17 February 1958) is a Ukrainian former professional football player and coach who played as a defender. He won 45 caps for the Soviet Union and made nearly 300 appearances for Dynamo Kyiv.

Life and career
Baltacha was developed by longtime Dynamo Kyiv and USSR national team coach Valeriy Lobanovskyi, who spotted Baltacha at the Kharkiv Oblast sports boarding school (today the Kharkiv College of Sports) of footballing excellence, which he had left home to attend at the age of 13. Before moving to Kharkiv, Baltacha started his football career in native Mariupol playing for local youth sports club "Azovstal". While being officially invited to Dynamo, in 1976 Baltacha spent his first season on loan playing for Metalist Kharkiv which at that time was playing at the third tier and his second season in Dynamo's reserves. It wasn't until 1978 when he finally made his debut for the Dynamo's first team that was hosting Spartak Moscow on 28 April 1978.

As preparation to the 1980 Summer Olympics, in 1979 Baltacha played couple of games for Ukraine at the Spartakiad of the Peoples of the USSR.

Baltacha was on the winning side in the Cup Winners' Cup in 1986, the Soviet Top League and Soviet Cup four times, and the Soviet Super Cup on three occasions. He also appeared in the FIFA World Cup in 1982, was a finalist in the European Championships in 1988 and won the bronze medal at the 1980 Summer Olympics in Moscow.

As the Soviet government eased restrictions on traveling abroad for athletes, in 1988 at age 30 Baltacha traveled to England and Scotland, playing for Ipswich Town and St Johnstone. His debut for Ipswich (in which he scored) was the first time a Soviet international had played in the Football League. He also had a spell as player manager of Inverness Caledonian in the Scottish Highland Football League, and was with Caledonian when they amalgamated with Inverness Thistle and entered the Scottish Football League in 1994 as Caledonian Thistle.

Baltacha worked as a physical education teacher and tutor at Bacon's College in South East London until 2012, having formerly been a physical education teacher at Geoffrey Chaucer Technology College (Old Kent Road, London) and a coach at the Charlton Athletic academy. Since 2012 Sergei Baltacha works as Professional Development Phase Lead Coach at the Charlton Athletic FC Academy.

Personal life
His ex-wife, Olga, master of sports in athletics, could have been on the Soviet olympic pentathlon team in 1980 Summer Olympics, but instead opted to remain at home to care for their one-year-old son, Sergei Jr, who became a professional footballer.

Their daughter, Elena, was a professional tennis player. She died on 4 May 2014, of liver cancer, aged 30.

Baltacha was married to Oksana.

Born in the Ukrainian part of the Soviet Union, Baltacha regards himself to be multi-national. His career achievements resulted in him being inducted into the Viktor Leonenko Hall of Fame in March 2012. Baltacha has stated in interview "I’m a citizen of the Soviet Union, but I love Ukraine. As for now, I’ve been in the United Kingdom for over 23 years, it’s my home. But I still go back to Ukraine regularly. It’s a beautiful country with good, kind people. I want to see it become more like European countries. But, I don’t think it has to lose ties with Russia, we are similar people, it’s in our blood".