MOSCOW, September 13 Captain of the National Hockey League (NHL) club ) “Washington Capitals” Alexander Ovechkin praised the NHL for the fact that the league did not punish Russian players for refusing to wear jerseys with rainbow symbols in support of LGBT people during pre-game warm-ups.
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"Well, what can I say here? Well done. It would be like this everywhere. How long will the NHL last? I don't know. This is not a question for me,” Ovechkin said in an interview with Izvestia.
In the 2022/23 season, the first person to refuse to support the action of solidarity with LGBT people was Philadelphia’s Russian defender Ivan Provorov. After the incident with Provorov, who did not wear a rainbow jersey because of his adherence to Orthodoxy, a number of NHL clubs that have Russian players refused to hold such an event. Individual players of San Jose and Florida, who are not Russians, also refused to participate in the action.
In June, the NHL abandoned the mandatory use of jerseys with rainbow symbols by teams in support of LGBT people during pre-game warm-ups. At the same time, events in support of the LGBT community will continue to be held, and rainbow sweaters will remain on sale.
