Moscow
Russian athletes could still be banned from competing with their national flag or anthem at this year’s Olympics. But Moscow has a plan to keep its sports institutions intact, its athletes busy and well-paid and, it hopes, its Russian fans happy.
In September, just one month after the Paris 2024 Olympics, Russia will launch the World Friendship Games, a Soviet-inspired extravaganza that resembles large-scale substitution games intended to defy the International Olympic Committee’s ban. Russian officials insist that the goal is not to replace the Olympics, but rather that Russian, Belarusian and other international voluntary participants will compete in many Olympic categories to win significant cash prizes and prizes. other honors.
Nonetheless, Moscow’s decision to launch these games and several other brand-new international sporting events has sparked controversy in Russia, sparked condemnation from the IOCand offered a number of Russian athletes a dubious choice between participating in these patriotic events or attempting to compete in Paris as “neutral” or independent competitors.
“Only a very limited number of (Russian) athletes will be qualified” to compete in Paris, the IOC said in a press release in mid-December. “Among the 4,600 athletes from around the world qualified so far for Paris 2024, there are only 11 neutral individual athletes”, six with a Russian passport and five with a Belarusian passport.
And even if few Russians welcome the Olympic ban their athletes are facing, it is not certain that they will find a satisfactory replacement in these new competitions.
Political games
The former Soviet Union was completely isolated from world sport until 1952, when it joined the Olympic movement. Soviet athletes quickly became regular and highly successful players on the international sporting scene.
Then, in 1984, at a particularly difficult moment in the Cold War, the USSR and its allies decided to boycott the Los Angeles Olympic Games to prevent their athletes from being the target of political condemnation following the Soviet invasion. of Afghanistan. Instead, it organized a rival event, the Moscow Friendship Games, in which 50 countries participated. Few Russian sports experts today express warm memories of these games or think they brought anything useful to world sport.
“You can call it whatever you want, World Games or Universal Games, and offer astronomical rewards, but such artificially invented competitions will never become real alternatives or push athletes to better results,” says Eduard Sorokin, sports journalist independent Russian. “Ultimately, these will be dull political spectacles that will have no lasting impact. »
Ironically, supporters of alternative games include many great Russian champions who have made names for themselves in international games and now occupy places of honor in Russian society. Former NHL hockey legend Viacheslav Fetisov, now a deputy in the lower house of parliament from the pro-Kremlin United Russia party, accused the IOC of “trampling on the rights” of all sports fans by banning athletes Russians to compete under their own national symbols. . “The IOC has burned the bridges and we don’t know what they intend to replace them with,” he told reporters.
Irina Rodnina, a three-time Olympic figure skating champion and also a Duma deputy, said previous Olympic bans targeted Russian athletes for alleged doping, often with good reason. Today, she told Russian media, “there are no complaints against the athletes, but there are complaints against the country. In this situation, I don’t know, maybe I’m from another generation, I wouldn’t go! With or without a flag, I wouldn’t go at all! Because it is a humiliation for the country.
In order to participate in the Olympics as independent competitors, Russian athletes will have to demonstrate that they have no ties to the military or security services and that they do not support the war in Ukraine, and that they will also be ready to renounce their Russian national affiliation. This could condemn many to languish without any access to world-class competitions until the global geopolitical crisis is resolved.
Experience during previous Olympics in which Russian national symbols were banned suggests that the Russian public and gamers are deeply unhappy with the limitations imposed on their participants, although it is unclear whether they will embrace the alternative games put in place by Russian authorities.
How much do Russians care?
In addition to the World Friendship Games in Moscow and St. Petersburg, which will largely follow the sports categories of the Summer Olympics, there will be a winter version called Winter Spartakiad, which will likely be held in Sochi, site of the last Olympic Games organized by Russia in 2014. A BRICS Games competition project is also on the drawing boards, which aims to attract athletes from the South. Russian sports authorities have discussed the possibility of “turning to Asia” in their competitive approach, which would be in line with Russia’s broader political and economic realignments.
Some Russian athletes may find a way to compete as neutrals at the Olympics and other international venues. For the rest, alternative games offer a work creation project allowing athletes to continue in some kind of competition, and also to earn money to continue.
The Kremlin has authorized a huge budget equivalent to $90 million for this year’s World Friendship Games, including about $50 million in prizes. While it seems unlikely that Olympic-level competitors from outside sanctioned countries like Russia and Belarus will be present, second-tier athletes from other countries are welcome. Organizers are optimistic that the Friendship Games could succeed up to 10,000 athletes from 137 countries.
Denis Volkov, director of the Levada Center, Russia’s only independent public opinion agency, says there have been no conclusive polls on how Russians feel about being excluded from many international sports. But the topic comes up in focus groups his agency organizes and, he reports, about half of those surveyed say they feel profoundly isolated. “Everyone seems sorry and thinks it’s a bad thing,” he said. “Most (of those interviewed) say that Russia is not responsible and that the West is plotting against us using Ukraine as a pretext. A small part blames Putin.”
As for the broader feeling of being excluded, at least from the Western world, Mr. Volkov says there is little evidence that Russians really care. “Sport is an area where isolation is felt, but in general people don’t seem very worried. It is worth pointing out that only about 20% of Russians have ever traveled abroad, and this represents only a small part of the urban population. When the subject comes up, many object that we are not really isolated because we have good relations with China. And polls actually show that China’s image has improved among the Russian public.”
In the final analysis, the alternative games could keep Russian athletics on life support, at least for now.
“These alternative games cannot replace the Olympics in any way, but at least athletes will be able to compete and achieve some of their goals,” says Alexander Shprygin, a controversial sports commentator and former sports adviser to the right-wing populist Liberal Democratic Party. . “So the main goal is to support the athletes, not to please the fans. Everyone, athletes and supporters, are just hostages of the political situation.”
Editor’s note: The article has been updated to clarify the number of Russian athletes who have the choice to participate in international competitions like the Olympics.