Georgia’s basketball team captain, 30-year-old Tornike Shengelia, has announced in a conversation with his native media Commersant.ge that he is leaving the club CSKA Moscow, which plays in the ULEB Euroleague and VTB United Basketball League.
“I take this decision in protest of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. I’m not going to play for a Russian army team! ” media quoted Schengen.
Nick Varlos, an employee of the agency representing athletes, has denied information that the basketball player had spoken to any media. For Shengelia, the main thing now is the welfare of the family, so he has left the team, but when the situation returns to normal, he will be ready to sit down at the negotiating table with the Moscow CSKA unit first.
The question arises as to whether false information has really been made public, or whether the agent is simply trying to smooth out possible financial or domestic troubles of his client. In any case, the fact that Schengen has left Moscow is true.
CSKA Moscow is a sports team supported by the Russian military system. Its abbreviation translates to the Army’s central sports club, on the basis of which this sports team was historically created. CSKA has been by far the strongest Russian basketball club in the last decade, having also competed successfully in the most prestigious club tournament in Europe – ULEB Euroleague.
Shengelia, who signed an agreement with CSKA only with the agreement that, despite the ULEB Euroleague calendar, will be played for the Georgian national team, has left Russia with his family and will probably go to Spain. The joining of the basketball player to the Russian club caused a huge resonance in Georgia from the very beginning. President Salome Zurabishvili was also outraged by the decision, who described it as deplorable and unacceptable.
Tornike became the first CSKA player to support Ukraine on Friday, writing the following on his Facebook page: “Please be strong in Ukraine.”
Shengelia has stood out in the CSKA ranks of ULEB Euroleague this season with an average of 12.7 points, 4.7 rebounds and two and a half passes. He is among the best in the team in all these indicators.
Jauns.lv has already reported that at the ULEB Euroleague club meeting on Friday, it was decided that three Russian teams – CSKA, Kazan “Unics” and St. Petersburg “Zenit” – will not be allowed to play their home games in Russia in the future. No other basketball club agreed to the proposal of Kaunas “Žalgiris” to exclude Russian teams from the tournament of 18 clubs.
All Russian teams are currently in the top eight of the tournament table and are actually claiming a place in the playoffs.
There is a high probability that the next matches will be played by Russian clubs in one of the countries that does not condemn the invasion of Ukraine. Serbia could be the most realistic candidate.
Other former Yugoslav republics, Bosnia and Herzegovina, initially refused to play in the World Cup qualifiers against Lithuania scheduled for Sunday. The Bosnians gave up the Lithuanian national team in a dramatic battle on their field on Thursday, but the planned trip to Vilnius was canceled. Representatives of Bosnia and Herzegovina explain their decision with the state of emergency declared in Lithuania, however, it is not excluded that showing solidarity with Russia, as Lithuania has been the most active in the basketball environment against military aggressor teams.
In the end, the Bosnians, aware of the possible sanctions, decided to go to Lithuania.
Meanwhile, the Russian basketball team played against the Dutch national team in Perm on Thursday, announcing that the game against Russia will be canceled after the match.
Both games between the British and Russian national teams have also been canceled.
Currently, the future of two Latvian basketball players Marek Mejers and Rolands Freimanis is also a bit uncertain. Both players represent the Russian club on a daily basis, Parma and Nizhny Novgorod, respectively. The dairy helped beat Belgium yesterday in the Latvian national team.
Two of Russia’s most popular athletes, Alexander Ochechkin of Washington’s “Capitals” hockey, who is considered a supporter of Kremlin policy, were not ashamed to criticize the war started in Ukraine yesterday. He did not criticize the Russian invasion of Ukraine, but the war as such and hopes that it will end sooner. He repeatedly emphasized at the press conference that he was unable to influence the events, adding that Vladimir Putin was the president of his country, but that Mr Owechkin himself was only an athlete.
And the seventh racket in the world ranking of tennis, Andrei Rublov, wrote a call on the camera of the operator to stop the war after winning the semi-finals of the Dubai tournament.
Meanwhile, at a press conference, Rublov pointed out that in the current situation, his tennis games are becoming irrelevant, because the war has started in Ukraine.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q1JbSXVHWW0
