ZUBOV: I AM A HOCKEY PLAYER, NOT POLITICIAN

Sergey Zubov, who recently announced about his refusal to go to Vancouver as reserve player, gave an interview to sport press.


SKA man Sergey Zubov called sport press correspondent after the match in Sokolniki, where he spend thirty minutes on the ice and was the only one player to score the shootout goal.

"After the KHL All-Star Game and departure to Novokuznetsk I was very busy", said Zubov. "That is why I had to talk to journalists at night, as I don’t have enough spare time".

"I didn’t expect that my announcement in sport press about my refusal to go to the Olympic games as reserve player would provoke big interest".

"I have been reading articles in mass media for these six days, read commentaries and online blogs. I was surprised that fans responded to my announcement aggressively, but most of all I was sad that atmosphere of the national team’s preparations for the Olympics had been disturbed".

"I am not a politician, I am hockey player and I don’t predict all my public moves unlike hockey ones. Moreover I haven’t lived in Russia for a long time and I haven’t restored my vocabulary yet".

"I think that most probably I was right except the harsh form of my refusal. At the same time I would like to introduce clarity in my announcement".

"Believe me that I have no claims to the head coach Vyacheslav Bykov. Slava and I are both products of HC CSKA, we played in one club and national team and we are in perfect relations".

"I know that he has done a lot to restore atmosphere in the national team and Russia’s two victories at the World Championships. I also know in which situation he is ahead of the Olympic games".

"My refusal was provoked by a call of administrator, who warned me that coaches take me to Vancouver as reserve player. I won’t hide that this conversation shocked me and the explanation is not in the fact that I would be in reserve. The main thing is the form how they informed me about it. To my mind people showed they are not professionals by behaving this way, and I was not ready for it after seventeen seasons of playing in NHL".

"I think that not all people deal with their own business in the Russian hockey and Bykov is just a hostage of this system. The team of managers should be responsible for formation of the national team’s squad and holding talks with players, while in Russia the head coach has to deal with this job".

"Vladislav Tretyak is famous former goalkeeper, the world hockey legend, he is manager of our national team, however managers’ work is something absolutely different from what we used to see in Russia. In NHL junior administrator or masseur would never call you and inform you that coaches take you to the team’s roster or not. It’s all manager’s responsibility".

"Each NHL player has his own agent and manager contacts him at first. That is the main reason why American and Canadian teams never face problems with the national team’s preparations".