The Olympic champion from Paris 2024 in the classical style, category up to 87 kg. Semen Novikov said that he still does not believe in the success of centralized training in order to be part of the national team.
The naturalized Ukrainian triumphed at the most authoritative sports forum, and then fell out of favor due to the policy of the new president of the federation, Stanka Zlateva, not to rely on wrestlers who have acquired Bulgarian citizenship.
Thus, Novikov missed a number of tournaments, including the world championship.
The main conflict is that the champion from Paris does not want to prepare centrally with the national team's coach Stoyan Dobrev, but with his personal trainer Soslan Farniev.
"I think people see everything. I know how I prepared for the Olympic Games and I do not agree with how they want me to prepare. My conditions are that they agree with the preparation with which I prepared for the Olympic Games. My personal trainer should always be with me. I haven't met with the national team coach, I'm not suggesting they replace him, but they can't force me to have someone as my personal trainer. They want to steal the work of personal trainers. I'm not losing anything," Novikov said, bTV reported.
"If I don't feel like I'm going to become a champion the way they want me to prepare, why should I do it? Just be a participant? It's not interesting to me. It's interesting to fight for gold," he added.
Against these scandals, the Board of Directors of the Wrestling Federation approved Shamil Mamedov - a Dagestani with a Bulgarian passport - to join the national team.
This seems to open the doors for Novikov again.
"If Stanka Zlateva changes her policy towards us, if they find compromises, I'm ready to compromise too. "But there has to be communication," he said.