Rodionenko: Melnikova let us down

Overall, both Russian MAG and WAG had a quite successful competition in Doha. Both won silver medals in the team finals and gymnasts made multiple individual finals. However, while MAG also picked up five individual medals (four of them by Artur Dalaloyan), Russian WAG finished without any individual medals. After Valentina Rodionenko got upset with the judging in the all-around final, you’d think she’d stay consistent and keep blaming the judges, especially since the FX event final results have been somewhat controversial. Instead, it seems, only the Russian gymnasts stayed consistent at this competition, while Rodionenko changed her tune and decided to blame Melnikova for the results. Perhaps, she thinks this will serve as great motivation, as she’s already attributed Dalaloyan’s results to her own pep talks?

Rodionenko said to TASS:

“I can say that due to the fact that four of our leading gymnasts had injuries and underwent surgeries, we only had one goal – to qualify to the Olympics. We put the women’s team together in order for it to be competitive in the team final. We currently don’t have anyone besides Melnikova who would be able to fight for an individual medal, we knew and expected this. Melnikova, unfortunately, let us down, after we return home, we’ll seriously look into it. She has no excuses and no reasons to compete like that”.

Rodionenko is clearly in the honeymoon period with Aliya Mustafina, though, as she only praised the gymnast and made zero comments about her weight this time:

“Mustafina did what she could, she cemented the team, she did everything she could. She hasn’t yet fully restored her bars routine: she had a lower difficulty even though her execution was great”.

According to Rodionenko, the 2003- and 2004-born seniors might have a good chance at making the Tokyo team as well as the girls who are currently recovering from injuries:

“We’ll have girls that will recover after the surgeries, the 2003-born girls will turn senior and they will be competing for a team spot as well. At the Olympics, the 2004-born girls will be able to compete, too. We have a very interesting girl from Rostov, she’s great, we haven’t shown her anywhere yet. The most important thing is to preserve her so that she would get competition experience in the next two years. It’s very much possible that [by Tokyo] the team will be different, the women’s team has to make the top 3 at the Olympics”.

She had plenty of nice things to say about the men’s team, though:

“Our sport is too injury-prone but if we preserve this team, we will fight for the first place at the Olympics, even though it won’t be easy competing with the Japanese at their home Games. We lost a few thousandth of a point in the team final where Artur made a mistake on bars but he completely rehabilitated himself in the all-around and event finals. Almost throughout the whole team final we were ahead of the Chinese team, and Russia was the only European country that earned an Olympic spot. We have serious ambitions: while we were second in Rio, we’ll fight for the first place now and this championship proved that the guys are growing and improving”.

She was also kind to Nagornyy who won the bronze in the all-around final but finished out of medals in the event finals:

“Yes, Nagornyy didn’t win medals [in the event finals] but he’ll win them, it’s only a matter of time. And Dalaloyan was competing as equal with the event specialists. Of course, there’s always work to do, there are still two years until the Olympics, the guys will clean up their routines, but everyone paid attention to these two guys, Dalaloyan and Nagornyy. They say that we hit the jackpot with two all-arounders of such level”.

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