Tutberidze on Medvedeva's reaction to the silver medal at the 2018 Olympic Games: "In the kiss-and-tell, she started congratulating us on the gold, saying that we did everything to make Zagitova the first"

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Eteri Tutberidze told how Medvedeva reacted to the silver medal at the 2018 Games.

– Alina becomes an Olympic champion. What is going on with you and Zhenya at this moment?

– First of all, Zhenya has already started some kind of estrangement situation with us. Already in preparation for the Olympics, at the training camp in Japan, she was somehow distancing herself. She and Ekaterina Bobrova became friends. And it’s like she’s a different girl.

Suddenly she answers you differently than she should. She deliberately wants to create a conflict somewhere. And there’s no more conflict. It’s all very strange. Because it shouldn’t come from Zhenya.

And then – I’m trying to get the federation to put us in an apartment with three rooms. Suddenly, on the day of settlement Zhenya comes to me and says: I will not be able to live with you.

I will not say the reason, because it is not very beautiful. I’m worried that someone will move in with us, and there will be Alina Zagitova, me and some other person. But no one has been moved in, thank God.

It was already as if she [Medvedeva] was trying to pull away a little bit. Why, I don’t know, but I don’t think it affected her skating in the best way. I missed the purity and sincerity in her skating.

I am demanding, I see thoroughly, I see that she could have done better. And in the short program she could have skated much better.

– How did she react to the silver medal?

– She started congratulating us on the gold medal, saying that we did everything to make Alina the first.

We did everything to get Alina first, but we also did everything to get Zhenya first. We can’t lead to places – we can lead to skating.

If we have already laid down in advance that there is a reserve in this skating. Naturally, my dream is that athletes go to the start, skate their best program. And then the judges will assign them places.

She didn’t want to talk to us further. We went to the lounge, tried to talk, but she was already talking to Orser.

It was kind of weird to me. Not that I didn’t pay attention. Of course, it’s unpleasant, but I couldn’t say for sure that she was leaving,” Tutberidze said in an interview with Leonid Slutsky on the YouTube channel “Comment.Show”.

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