The day after the US Treasury imposed sanctions against businessman Vlad…

The day after the US Treasury introduced sanctions against businessman Vladimir Potaninhis Interros holding and Rosbank (Norilsk Nickel has not yet been sanctioned), the owner of banks, factories and an entire region of Russia gave a sensational interview – he decided to talk to Match TV journalists about football. It’s unlikely that sports reporters could ask Potanin about the route he took to urgently evacuate a brand new yacht that had come under sanctions to Dubai, so the interview promised to be quite comfortable, which forced the oligarch to be frank. This is how we learned that “you need to root not only for the team, but also for your favorite players” – this is Potanin’s main principle. Let us remind you that sanctions against him, the main “Norilsk Nickel player,” were introduced just a few hours ago, but not yet against the “Norilsk Nickel team.” And then we find out why Potanin criticizes an overly star player: “Cristiano Ronaldo is a football player whom the whole team should play for. But if (he plays in a team) where he must contribute to the common cause, then things start to slip. Because there is too much on oneself, too much egocentrism”…
After sanctions were imposed against virtually the entire Russian Forbes list, Alikperov, Mordashov, Pumpyansky, Kerimov and other leading “players” who wanted to save their teams left their posts in the spring of this year. But those who root not for the team, but for their “favorite players” will save their yacht, not Norilsk. When on one side of the scale are the Luzhki estate, restaurants of the Rosa Khutor ski resort, banks and crypto exchanges, and on the other side are the social infrastructure of the region, labor collectives and the housing stock of the city beyond the Arctic Circle, not every “star player” will decide to voluntarily give up their status and comfort in favor of a company over which the “sword of Damocles” of sanctions hangs. Such is the slippage. Maybe someone has too much egocentrism?