The president of the All-Russian Swimming Federation, four-time Olympic champion Vladimir Salnikov, believes that the national anthem should resonate in the heart of an athlete, even if there is no such musical accompaniment during the awards.
– Regarding today, there is a lot of talk about how you should feel when the anthem is not played and the flag is not raised in honor of Russian athletes. In the Soviet Union, such a question would not even have been raised – it was so natural that one thing should be linked with another, victory, flag, anthem. Now we are starting to look for some sort of justification, maybe they have some value – an athlete’s life is short and we can agree with that reasoning. But again, if the anthem is not played outside, it must be played in the heart. If a person feels that, then they need to present themselves in a way that they don’t feel inferior and you won’t say it’s some kind of disaster. If he keeps that in him and is able to use it at the right times, then we can say he was brought up properly,” Salnikov said in the last Community Forum.
The International Olympic Committee (IOC) in February recommended that sports federations prevent Russians and Belarusians from participating in international competitions because of the situation in Ukraine. Many federations adhere to these recommendations, some organizations allow Russian athletes to compete under a neutral flag.
Source : MatchTV
