Between Two Olympic Fires
There are far fewer prestigious sports events in odd years than in even ones. An odd year is the year between the summer and winter Olympic games or the year between the European and World Football Championships. However, this does not mean that an odd year abolishes the bitterness of defeat and the joy of victory, lowers the heat of sports competitions, or makes fans forget about their sports idols. Surely the achievements of the athletes in our rating for the odd year 2003 are no less honorable than in any even year.
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| Photo: Dmitry Azarov |
| Svetlana Khorkina added to her collection of titles in 2003. The two-time Olympic champion became the absolute world champion for the third time. Not even the legendary Larisa Latynina and Lyudmila Turishcheva have so many top-ranking titles |
We chose the year’s ten best athletes as follows. First, anyone who wanted to could vote for his or her favorite athlete on Kommersant Publishing House’s website (www.kommersant.ru). Second, ten sports experts from various publications also voted for their choice of the ten best. The final rating was compiled with consideration of the rank of a given candidate in both the fans’ rating and the sports critics’ rating.
Viewer voting was especially frenzied. We sometimes had the feeling that some fans turned to friends in fan clubs to collect more votes. During the voting, the name of football player Vadim Evseev was added to the list of candidates. His candidacy was not even considered until he scored a goal in the Welsh team’s net. After getting on the list later than everyone else, Evseev almost immediately ended up in third place. This is entirely deserved considering Evseev’s leading role in the suspense drama “The Russian Football Team’s Journey to the 2004 European Championship.” We would really like to see the players in this championship in next year’s rating of best athletes.
All the Article in Russian as of Jan. 12, 2004
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