In 1994, he was hired as an assistant coach for the top Russian club at the time, Spartak Moscow.

[3] In June 1998 Yartsev was appointed the head coach of Spartak's cross-city arch-rival, Dynamo Moscow.

In August 2003, Russia was very close to elimination from their Euro 2004 preliminary qualification group and the coach Valery Gazzayev, was fired.

Under Yartsev's management, Russia qualified for the playoff preliminary qualification matches, in which they beat Wales.

Later key Russian midfielder Egor Titov was disqualified for testing positive for an illegal performance-enhancing drug, Wales asked to be declared winners because of that, but that request was ultimately denied and their court case dismissed.

After a 7–1 loss to Portugal in the 2006 FIFA World Cup qualifying Yartsev kept his job, but then resigned after a 1–1 draw with Estonia.

In early 2007, he was hired as a coach for FC Torpedo Moscow, who got relegated in 2006 from the Russian Premier League for the first time in its history.

He was fired on June 20, 2007, Torpedo was in 7th place in First Division at the time (only the top 2 teams get promoted into the Premier League).