“We must treat our victories with care and respect.” Matytsin called Rodnina’s statements on Valieva’s case unacceptable

Head of the Russian Sports Ministry Oleg Matytsin reacted to the words of the three-time Olympic champion Irina Rodnina regarding the case of a Russian figure skater Kamila Valieva .

Earlier, Rodnina told Sport24 that Valieva’s defense needs to “learn to lie better”.

— It’s strange to hear such statements from a State Duma deputy, three-time Olympic champion. Such public assessments, based on our own conjectures and not supported by knowledge of the details of the process, are unacceptable. This is a violation of the ethics and culture of the sports community.

We must treat our victories, our coaches and our athletes with care and respect, unite Russian society through sports and not create provocative information flows intended for distribution in the media,” Matytsin was quoted as saying by the press service of the Ministry of Sports.

Valieva at the 2022 Olympic Games in Beijing helped the Russian team win gold in the team competition. Before the personal tournament, it became known that the banned drug trimetazidine was found during the doping test of the figure skater of the Russian championship. The CAS admitted the Russian to the individual competitions of the Games, where she took fourth place.

At the end of September, the CAS announced that the hearings in the Valieva case had been postponed and would resume on November 9 and 10.