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First came the reverberating cheers. Then a deluge of soft toys lobbed from the stands. But across the face of the brilliant Russian skater Adeliia Petrosian there was only the faintest of smiles. For now.
So far at these Winter Olympics, a Russian is yet to win a medal. But there is a live possibility that could change on Thursday when the 18-year-old Petrosian, who sits in fifth after the short programme, takes to the ice again shortly after 9pm.
It won’t just be in Milan where people will be watching the result closely, but in the very highest places in Moscow too. Which tells you something about how the mood music has shifted in Russia – and how its return from the sporting cold is closer than you might think.
Two years ago the Kremlin could not have been more frigid about the Paris Olympics. In fact, the few Russians who competed as “authorised neutral athletes”, after they were vetted to check they did not explicitly support the war in Ukraine, were criticised.
Irina Viner, Russia’s rhythmic gymnastics president, even went as far as to call those who went “traitors”, and suggested that only “homeless” athletes competed without their flag and anthem. One rower told Match TV that the Kremlin had compensated Russian competitors who dropped out.
Now, though, Russia is firmly behind its Olympians again. As Russia’s press secretary, Dmitry Peskov, said before the Games: “I’ll definitely be watching wherever our guys perform. It’s a must-see.”
That view was vociferously amplified by the TV presenter and Putin loyalist Dmitry Guberniev on Wednesday. After calling Petrosian “a great girl” and predicting she would beat everyone, he reflected the shift in Moscow’s support for the 13 Russians here in Milano Cortina, in bawdy terms.
“It’s interesting how life changes,” he said. “I see posters everywhere on the roads about our beloved Olympians in Italy. Many called the Paris Olympians traitors. Life is changing for the better, all those arrogant little bastards and assholes are keeping their mouths shut now.”
It might sound strange to western ears – especially given the war in Ukraine is still raging, and Russia was also previously banned for massive state-sponsored doping at the Sochi Olympics they hosted in 2014 – but most seasoned Olympic insiders believe Russia will be allowed back this year.
Look at the direction of travel. In December the International Olympic Committee called for Russian youth athletes to be allowed to compete internationally under their own flag, paving the way for them to compete at the Youth Games this summer.
And this month Kirsty Coventry, the IOC president, insisted that “every athlete should be allowed to compete freely without being held back by the politics and divisions of their governments”. She didn’t explicitly mention Russia. But everyone in the room knew which country she was talking about.
Certainly, Mikhail Degtyarev, Russia’s sports minister and head of the Russian Olympic Committee, sounded bullish on Wednesday, as he predicted a return to international sport under the Russian flag and anthem could come as soon as April or May.
And there was also a jagged edge to his remarks, as he warned the IOC what would happen if they didn’t hurry up. “If the IOC doesn’t bring our case up for discussion, we will, of course, go to court,” he told the Russian website Championat.
“The cutoff date is May,” he added. “And we won’t just go to court demanding the reinstatement of the Russian Olympic Committee, but we will file a commercial lawsuit in Swiss civil courts, because we are losing money that we spend on training athletes who were barred from competition due to the IOC’s decision. An unlawful decision, in our opinion.”
Two outstanding issues remain. The first is over Russia’s breach of the Olympic charter by unilaterally including regions of Ukraine in the Russian Olympic Committee – which is the reason it is banned from Milano Cortina. And it also still has to pay outstanding fees to the World Anti-Doping Agency. But no one believes these are significant barriers to re-entry – including Degtyarev.
Meanwhile on the slopes in Italy there has been only the occasional gripe and grudge from the Russian team about how they have been treated. This week the Russian ski mountaineer Nikita Filippov claimed that the organisers did not give him a free mobile phone because he was a neutral athlete. “All athletes are given Samsung phones, but we were shortchanged, only given shampoo and toothpaste,” he said in an unboxing video on social media. “Oh well, we didn’t come here for phones.”
There was also mild frustration back in Russia when Petr Gumennik was awarded sixth place in the men’s figure skating, with even Peskov, whose wife is the former Olympic champion Tatiana Navka, getting involved. “I am not a specialist, but my wife says that Petr could have easily been in the top three with a different attitude from the judges,” he said.
And while some back home remain queasy about their athletes competing as neutrals, rather than in the red of Russia, Degtyarev urged them to think of the bigger picture. “I can tell these people that our athletes, who are making their way abroad as neutrals, have not given up their passports, citizenship, flag and anthem,” he said. “They love Russia, they fight for it, and the whole world knows they are Russian.”
And if there are no medals, will that be a blow to prestige, he was then asked. “It would be a blow if we weren’t there at all,” came the reply. “And the fact that we’re there is already a good result.”
So what price we see Donald Trump shaking hands with Vladimir Putin at the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics opening ceremony – and the Russian flag waving as 250 of its athletes enter the coliseum? A year ago it would have sounded preposterous. Now only a fool would rule it out.
