BIOGRAPHY
For the current generation of handball fans, Talant Dujshebaev is probably better known as one of the world’s top coaches. But before he began his coaching career almost 20 years ago, Dujshebaev was one of the best players of his generation.
Dujshebaev was born in 1968 in the Soviet Union, in what is now Kyrgyzstan. As a junior he started playing handball at CSKA Moscow, and remained at the club when he became a senior player and part of the USSR national team. With CSKA, Dujshebaev won the EHF Champions Cup - the precursor to the EHF Champions League - in 1988.
Dujshebaev’s first years as a national player began just before the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, and while he won gold at the 1989 IHF Junior World Championship, by the 1992 Olympic Games Dujshebaev and his teammates were competing as the Unified Team. In Barcelona the Unified Team beat Sweden’s ‘Bengan Boys’ to gold with Dujshebaev becoming the tournament’s top scorer and best centre back.
The following year, Russia took their first IHF Men’s World Championship title, defeating France in the final. It was to be Dujshebaev’s last medal for the Russian national team.
In 1992 Dujshebaev moved from Moscow to Spanish club Teka Cantabria and by 1995 had received Spanish citizenship.
Teka Cantabria won the EHF Cup in 1993 and the inaugural EHF Champions League competition in 1994, and the IHF Super Globe in Dujshebaev’s final year with the club, 1997. Dujshebaev then moved to Germany for a few years, first to Lübbecke and then to GWD Minden, before returning to Spain to finish his playing career at Ciudad Real. There, he added the EHF Champions Trophy and the EHF Cup Winners’ Cup to his trophy cabinet.
For Spain, Dujshebaev won Olympic bronze in 1996 and 2000, EHF EURO silver in 1996 and 1998, and EHF EURO bronze in 2000. He was MVP at the EHF EURO 1996, 1997 World Championship, and the Sydney 2000 Olympic Games.
In 2005 Dujshebaev became Ciudad Real’s coach, leading them to many trophies including the EHF Champions League in 2006, 2008 and 2009. In 2014, he moved to Industria Kielce in Poland, winning the Champions League again in 2016. He also briefly coached the Hungarian and Polish national teams.
Dujshebaev has passed down his handball genes to his sons Alex and Daniel, both of whom currently play at Kielce.
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