On Thursday it became known about the departure of the former Soviet figure skater, and later coach Gurgen Vardanyan from the post of sports director of the Hungarian Figure Skating Federation. Is this connected with the dominance of ex-Russians in the national team and what can happen to them next — in the material of the Sport correspondent.
Vardanyan is a symbolic person for Hungarian figure skating. He moved to work in Budapest back in the late 80s, and it is with him that the main success of the country in the modern period of the development of this sport is connected — the victory of Julia Shebeshtien at the 2004 European Championship. True, the main star of that time, the Russian woman Irina Slutskaya, did not perform on it due to illness, but for the story in which Shebeshtien and Vardanyan, who trained her from a young age (with short breaks), entered their name, these are, as they say, already nuances. Moreover, this achievement is not the only one — other athletes periodically climbed to the podium of various major international tournaments.
But then the results of Hungarian figure skating began to deteriorate. In 2018, Vardanyan became the sports director of the federation, and to make it clear in what state he took over, it is enough to explain: at the Olympic Games of that year, only one figure skater from the country competed — Yvette Toth, who took 23rd place. The situation needed to be urgently corrected, and Vardanyan followed the path that many small national figure skating federations follow — the targeted naturalization of «legionnaires». And the fact that Russia is the main supplier of athletes in this sport is far from a secret.
Therefore, it is not surprising that in subsequent years, several Russian skaters changed their sports citizenship to Hungarian. During the Olympic cycle under the leadership of Vardanyan, however, the Hungarians — both «new» and «old» — did not achieve much success. Only Yulia Shchetinina and Mark Magyar showed a tangible result: at the 2022 European Championships, the figure skaters who trained in the group of Dmitry Savin and Fedor Klimov in Sochi became sixth in pair skating. But they failed to perform at the Olympics: upon arrival in Beijing, the partner passed a positive test for coronavirus, and the Games ended before they started. » />
And yet, one cannot fail to note the work to strengthen the prospects for Hungarian figure skating, which was carried out by the sports director of the federation. So, in the past post-Olympic season, all experts noted the young sports couple Maria Pavlova/Alexei Svyatchenko. Having started skating together only a year ago, these skaters, who previously represented Russia in other combinations, took fifth place at the European Championships and seventh at the World Championships, and, according to many experts, the athletes' marks were greatly underestimated at both tournaments.
Dancers Maria Ignatieva and Daniil Semko also showed progress in results. If a year ago, the duet of the ex-Russian and ex-Ukrainian was 18th at the European Championships and 22nd at the World Championships, then last season the students of Alexander Svinin and Irina Zhuk entered the top ten at the European championship, and at the World Championships they became 20th. mi, having qualified for the free program. Given the young age of the athletes (20 and 23 years old) and a serious coaching staff, it can be assumed that in the coming years Ignatieva and Semko are able to rise even higher. they did not invite major stars from abroad to their pupils, but in the end it was they who detonated an information bomb near Vardanyan. Promising junior Vivien Papp said in September last year that she wants to leave the national team due to the fact that former Russian Polina Dzhumaniyazova began to play for Hungary.
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«I showed excellent results, but it turned out that the country did not need me, she found a Russian woman,» Papp said in an interview with local media. In these words, of course, there was an exaggeration, since «excellent» 25th place at the World Junior Championships and 8th and 12th places at the stages of the Junior Grand Prix is difficult to name.
Further events began to develop incrementally. There were also dissatisfied with the arrival of ex-Russians Alexander and Alexei Vlasenko in the Hungarian men's single skating. The local figure skater Moses Berei left not yet the national team — his practically absent results do not yet allow blackmailing at a high level — but the club. But the motivation voiced in the press was about the same
“For Russians, HUN is just letters on the uniform, but they are preferred by athletes who sincerely love their native country.”
And in February of this year, a collective letter from the parents of Hungarian skaters appeared, in which Vardanyan and his ex-wife Eranyak Ipakyan, who held a post in the national team, were accused of «most favored nation treatment», including financial nature, ex-Russians. Yulia Shebeshtien also got it — she was charged with abuse in coaching.
Perhaps, it was at this moment that Vardanyan's fate as head of the national federation was sealed. Although they broke up with him with the wording “by mutual agreement” published on the official website of the organization, and the reasons for such a personnel decision were not given in the release, sources familiar with the situation interviewed by the correspondent confirmed that Vardanyan was punished for an excessive number of Russians in the national team. The ex-director of the Hungarian federation himself refuses to comment yet.
The question of whether the current international situation influenced the decision to dismiss the official who was actively saturating the national team with Russian legionnaires also, of course, remains unanswered in the release. But it is, however, rhetorical — even taking into account the fact that Hungary's political position differs from that of the majority of EU members. Another thing is more important — what will happen to the ex-Russians who managed to get Hungarian passports next. With this, there is still uncertainty — the coaching staffs who worked with the athletes representing Hungary, including in the Russian arenas, could not say anything specific. So far, of course, there are no decisions — very little time has passed since the termination of Vardanyan's contract with the Hungarian federation.
But it is not ruled out that the «most favored nation» regime may change to the «most unfavorable» regime. What does this mean? It is clear that no one will deprive ex-Russians of their Hungarian passports. But, for example, the federation may refuse to pay for their training outside of Hungary, as well as other related expenses, and the athletes will either have to look for their own sources of funding, or go (the word «return» is less appropriate here) to their new homeland. In general, he will do everything to extinguish the conflict that has flared up.
Much here will depend on the position of the new leadership of the federation, but it has not yet been officially announced. In principle, it is hardly in his interests to shoot himself in the foot, that is, to artificially push those legionnaires who are really stronger than homegrown figure skaters. But the practice of the last year has shown that politics can force functionaries to make wild decisions. It remains to wait what happens now.
The opinion of the author may not coincide with the position of the editors.