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AP publishes article comparing sports lives of Azerbaijani and British wrestlers

16 June 2015 08:20 (UTC +04:00)

The article says: “As Mariya Stadnyk hugged the first lady of Azerbaijan on the top step of the European Games podium Monday, her sister-in-law Yana Rattigan prepared to return to the grind of multiple jobs and 18-hour days, APA reports quoting AP.

The two hail from the same city in Ukraine and both are world-class wrestlers, but their experiences of the inaugural European Games in the ex-Soviet nation of Azerbaijan could not be more different.

While Stadnyk represents oil-rich, wrestling-mad Azerbaijan and trains at purpose-built facilities, Rattigan works multiple jobs to keep her career alive after her adopted nation, Britain, cut wrestling's funding altogether following the 2012 London Olympics.

The daily grind has taken its toll. Rattigan, twice a European championship silver medalist whose brother is Stadnyk's husband and coach, came to the games struggling with fatigue and a knee injury and was defeated in the first round.

"At home my routine is from 4:30, 5 o'clock in the morning till 11 at night," she told The Associated Press. "I work for this, for that, I'm out hustling everywhere, just to be able to wrestle. So now is a luxury."

If Rattigan wasn't at the games, she'd be out marketing perfume with free samples.

"'Do you want a spray?' That's me," she says with a laugh. "I'm a top seller. I'm a good talker."

British government agency UK Sport poured funding into wrestling to build a team for the London Olympics, but ended its support months after the games under a system of restricting funds to the most successful sports.

"It feels like the sport is dying and that's a horrible thing," says Rattigan, adding that one reason she has not retired yet is to give the children she coaches something to aspire to.

Rattigan and Stadnyk are part of a modern sports world where changes of national allegiance are commonplace. They grew up in Lviv in western Ukraine, but went in different directions. Stadnyk became one of several foreign-born athletes to join Azerbaijan's state-funded sports system, while Rattigan switched to Britain after marrying British wrestler Leon Rattigan. He has since quit the sport and works to help fund his wife's career.

Both sisters-in-law profess huge pride in their adopted nations.

"I'm in seventh heaven with happiness," Stadnyk said after winning gold. "At home, where so many people were watching me, I was basically ready to show all my best. It couldn't have been any other way."

Speaking Russian rather than Azeri, Stadnyk acknowledged she knew little more of Azerbaijan's language than the national anthem she had sung with gusto at the medal ceremony.

"Maybe I'm singing something wrong because I'm self-taught," she said.

Rattigan's national pride takes a different form - she sees her evangelism for wrestling as a way to change British society for the better by keeping youngsters out of trouble.

"It's a sport that doesn't matter if you're rich or poor, you don't need expensive equipment. All you need is a will and passion and a wish to be better," she says. "If you take any of the world champions, Olympic champions in wrestling, most of these people come from very poor families. ... It takes kids from the streets to a place they can lose their energy without doing crimes."

Britain was a major power in Olympic wrestling a century ago, but last won an Olympic medal in 1984. Rattigan is relying on the power of the Internet to revive British wrestling's fortunes, whether by arranging invitations to foreign teams' training camps, keeping in contact with fans or crowdfunding her travel costs for September's world championships in Las Vegas.

“We have lots of kids writing letters to us saying: 'Oh, we look up to you, we wish you good luck.' They all tweet you, follow you on Facebook,” she says. “When you win a medal it's more for them.””