Ukrainian sports have been losing a lot of athletes lately. A few days ago, we informed you that the silver medalist in parallel bars at the 2024 Paris Olympics, Ilya Kovtun, will receive a Croatian passport.
Most recently, several Ukrainian volleyball players fled after a European Championship match because their teammate was militarized.
The latest case is of a family of karatekas - spouses Yevgeny and Daria Pylypyuk did not return to their homeland after a competition in Venice.
The couple has reportedly deleted their social media accounts and changed their phone numbers. The two have already been expelled from the Ukrainian national team, and now the country is trying to get them banned for life from international competitions.
The president of the karate federation called the case a "stain on the team". "As their coach, I feel some responsibility because Yevgeny Pylypyuk has been training with me since he was 6 years old.
Now he is 25 and I probably missed something somewhere... I partly take the blame on myself. They did not contact me, I tried to convince them to return through other athletes, but my efforts were in vain. This is a huge stain on the team and not only that," suspilne.media quotes Pikulin.