Stoycho Mladenov - official website» Biography

Biography

Biography As a player Dimitrovgrad Beroe CSKA Belenenses Vitoria Estoril Bulgaria national team As a coach Olhanense CSKA Belenenses CSKA Bulgaria Under 21 Bulgaria national team CSKA Litex Kastoria Kalithea Veria CSKA Al Ahly Jeddah Al Ettifaq ENPPI CSKA CSKA Career as player Successes CV
Stoycho Mladenov is one of the greatest Bulgarian football players and coaches. He was born on 12 April 1957 in the small town of Ploski. He first started playing football for the team of Dimitrovgrad. After being transferred to "Beroe" (Stara Zagora), he marked his first appearance for the team by scoring his first goal in the Bulgarian premier league. His true success came with the team of CSKA (Sofia), with which he won the Bulgarian premier league fourth times and in 1983 he got Bulgarian player of the year award. The pinnacle of his career came on 17 March 1982; CSKA qualified for the quarterfinals of the European Champions' Cup, where it faced the defending champion - "Liverpool". After being defeated 0:1 at "Anfield", CSKA won by 2:0 in Sofia with Mladenov scoring both goals. It was rumored after the game that "Liverpool" wanted to sign up Mladenov for the next season, but the sport's authorities in Bulgaria would not allow the transfer to go forward.

Throughout the years, Mladenov was on the transfer lists of "Athletico" (Madrid) and "River Plate". In 1986 Mladenov, along with most of his teammates of the CSKA star generation, finally got his chance to play abroad. He joined "Belenenses" of Portugal and won the Cup of Portugal with the team. After that he played consecutively for "Vitoria" (Setubal), "Estoril" and finished his career in "Olhanenses". He has 59 caps for the national teams and has scored 15 goals. Thanks to his late goal against the? former East Germany DDR, Bulgaria managed to qualify for the World Cup in Mexico 1986. At the championship he started in three of the four games.

The coaching career of Stoycho Mladenov began in the club, where he finished his active player career - "Olhanense". He returned quickly to the club where he earned most of his success as player - CSKA. As an assistant coach to Georgi Vassilev he won the last double for the "Reds" in 1997. He moved back to Portugal to coach "Belenenses", but was soon back in CSKA. In 1999 Mladenov was appointed head coach of the Bulgarian junior national team. Under his supervision the team was joined by some of the current Bulgarian national stars - the likes of Dimitar Berbatov, Stilian Petrov, Martin Petrov. A year later he succeeded Dimitar Dimitrov as head coach of the first Bulgarian national team. In 2002 he was appointed head coach of CSKA for the first time. His season started on high note as CSKA got 13 straight wins that won him the title in the Bulgarian premier league. In 2004 he headed "Litex", before working in Greece in the teams of "Kastoria", "Kallithea", "Veroia". The second spell of Mladenov as head coach for CSKA was even more successful - in April 2007 he succeeded his former teammate Plamen Markov and in the next season he won again the title for CSKA without losing a single game. After his team CSKA was stripped of its right to play in the  Champion's League, he left the team and went to "Al Ahli" (Jeddah), Saudi Arabia. He then immediately won one of the most valuable Asian football trophies - the Cup of the Persian Gulf. He promoted the team the Champions League of Asia, but despite that left his coaching position at the end of the season. He stayed in Saudia Arabia as coach of "Ettifaq" and then in the beginning of 2010 moved to the Egyptian club of ENNPI and received the award for the most successful coach of the fall season of 2010/2011.Mladenov is certified sport manager of the Bulgarian sports academy.