Emil
Rajkovikj
Head coach
Date of birth: 11.09.1978 (45)
Place of birth: Skopje (Macedonia)
Citizenship: Macedonia
Emil Rajkovic is a former Macedonian professional basketball player. He started his coaching career in 2006 as a coach of the Macedonian club «KK Feni Industries» (2006 — 2013), he also headed the coaching staffs of «KK Rabotnicki» from Macedonia (2013/2014) and the Polish «Silesk-Wroclaw» (2014 — 2016). He was recognized as the “Coach of the Year” four times in the Macedonian Championship between 2008 and 2014. In the Polish league, he was recognized as the “Best Coach” for the last two years in 2017 and 2018. With the Macedonian team, «KK Feni Industries» he won the Balkan League in 2011. In Europe, Emil Rajkovic is known as an unyielding and natural winner. He is from that plethora of new-generation coaches from the former Republic of Yugoslavia, who is being predicted a great future.
In addition to high coaching qualifications, he is an excellent motivator and is well versed in psychology.
Under the leadership of Emil Rajkovic, “Astana” held the best VTB United League season in its history — 2018/2019. In the United League championship, the Kazakhstan team won a record 15 victories (57.7% is also the best result), which allowed it to take 6th place in the season. Also, for the first time in the history of the League, “Astana” had a positive balance of scored and missed points on average in the regular season (+2.7). In March, the capital basketball players broke their record for the number of victories in the “regular season” — 13, and after success in the game with “Yenisey”, they demonstrated the best result in the percentage of matches won — 60. The team from the capital of Kazakhstan taught everyone to fight to the last seconds. Quite often, “Astana” started a game not that bright, but thanks to the changes that the coaching staff brought in during the game, the team managed to recoup and gain strong-willed victories. As for the success of the wards of Emil Rajkovic in Kazakhstan tournaments, under his leadership, Astana won 7th Kazakhstan Cup, and the 7th victory in the Kazakhstan Championship was the main achievement, thanks to which «Astana» became the most decorated men's team in the country.
Emil Rajkovic’s contribution to the team’s progress did not go unnoticed and he was recognized as the best coach of the VTB United League championship season 2018/2019. The awarding ceremony took place in Nur-Sultan before the third match of the quarter-finals of the playoff series between «Astana» and «Khimki».
