Former Ukraine midfielder Yevhen Levchenko shared his views on the participation of William Gallas and other foreigners in the Legends Cup in Moscow.
- What was your reaction when you learnt about the participation of William Gallas, who was also coming to a charity match in support of Ukraine in London?
- I would say this - it is not about one person who went there. When footballers who live and work in Europe and the world go to russia, they are in full support of russian sport and support the killing of Ukrainians in the war. This in russia will be used to show that everything is fine with them, everything is working. The fact that these players went there for such a match is a horror. I don't think we need to talk about Gallas alone here.
- Perhaps in London you were able to socialise or hear his rhetoric at the time?
- No, I didn't socialise with him. I haven't even had any conversations about it with him. If you want to sensationalise anything about him, I can't say anything. All those who went there from Europe - to me they are people who don't understand what they are doing.
- I would like to ask you as a football functionary and a person working in this field - what mechanisms do you think there could be to prevent sports stars from travelling to Russia?
- I don't think it can be banned in any way. We understand that Russia with money or something else attracts people coming from Africa, Colombia or countries that do not fully understand everything now. They say that there is a war in Ukraine, but it means nothing to them. The same Kuranyi, who played so many years in Moscow, goes there because he knows he has friends there. He has no connection with the fact that Russians support murder and war.
In my opinion, we need to tell and show how propaganda plays into the hands of Russians. That's the only way to do it. You can't ban a person from going to russia. If she's so goofy, she'll go and play. If Kuranyi says to Mendes, Abidal or anyone else, for example, "yeah listen, you and I will earn money, we'll play", they don't see anyone getting killed there. They don't see any pain and suffering of our people.
UEFA and FIFA will not ban this. It should be done solely in the form of information pressure. If you try to ban it, what will they say? What can be banned? Nothing can be done.
For many players there are no causal factors. Because they don't feel it. And we all need to do our best to make them understand that the consequences of such a trip are more dead Ukrainians.
It was painful to look at the same Andrei Karjaka, who, as far as I remember, was born in Ukraine. Coach Yuriy Adjem (born in Crimea - ed.) too, whom I still saw. He was my coach at CSKA, it was like a knife to my heart.