Last week Aliya Mustafina went to train in Penza instead of attending the World Cup in Osijek because of her knee injury.
Pavel Pavlov was coaching her during that week as her main personal coach, Sergei Starkin, was in Osijek with Denis Abliazin. Pavlov said to local news that currently, it’s still not clear whether Mustafina will be able to participate in the Russian Cup as they are waiting for the doctors’ permission to continue with the training:
“[Her participation] is still in question because we only did an MRI yesterday since she was given an injection in her knee two weeks ago. We’ll see if the injection gave any positive results. The MRI results will be sent to Germany, to the doctors who have known and been treating Aliya for years, because right now she is not able to go in person. If they allow training more, we’ll try. I hope that we’ll still go to the Russian Cup”.
Pavlov also said that he believes this injury will only be a minor stumble for Mustafina:
“I’ve known her for a long time. She’s a very goal-oriented girl, she sets extremely high goals for herself and, as we see, she’s able to reach them. I don’t think that this leg injury can break her mentally now”.
This week Mustafina will participate in a national team training camp at Round Lake.
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