Only Sports Give Nation Pride

Sports in fact remain almost our only national pride. It is the achievements of our athletes on the world arena that give people in every nook and cranny of the world an opportunity not to forget that Ukraine still exists. This was the subject of the conference called Concepts of Developing Physical Culture and Sports in Ukraine held in Rivne and attended by athletes and coaches.

This forum was addressed by one of the most respected people in the sport circles, vice president of the National Olympic Committee as well as rector of the National University of Physical Culture and Sports Volodymyr Platonov.

He said that big-time sports is now on a turning point. While at the 1996 Olympics the Ukrainian team gathered under its colors mostly athletes who had been trained still in Soviet times, now we must bring up in the immediate future a new constellation of athletes capable of fighting for medals in the most prestigious competitions. This will not be an easy thing to do for lack of funds.

Mr. Platonov characterized in quite unpleasant terms so-called professional sports in Ukraine. In his words, while professionals all over the world earn money for their existence and, what is more, replenish the state treasury, our “professionals” depend on the budget and demand support.

Athletes said frankly behind the scenes of the conference that we so far have an over-bureaucratized sports apparatus often pursuing goals that is very far from sports. And no one knows when the situation will begin to change.