2017-2018 Olympic Team Russia - Predictions

puremagic said:

Boikova/Kozlovski are the next Zabiyako/Enbert or Astakhova/Rogonov. Same average skating skills and no hopes for the titles. Australians are much better and it's obvious.

About Russian junior pairs I know enough because I judge looking at JGP events. Some local Russian competitions - it's not an indication of the level of pairs. So if in the next JGP season I'll see some good Russian pair - I'd be happy. But for now I don't see any team which could be close to M/M level.

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You know nothing about Russian junior pairs if you are making your opinion based only on JGP events, and the next season you may look quite stupid if you reread your posts. The problem with you judging the pair skating only based on JGP events is that a lot of junior pairs split up and formed new pairs just before this season, so when there were the test skates in August, those pairs were skating together only for 2-3 months (and some had one of the partners new to pairs). So that meant that they were not qood in August yet, therefore have not been invited to the test skates and did not receive JGP event. But if you watched junior pairs throughout the season, for example watching the Russian internal competitions, you may notice that some of those new junior pairs are quite consistent, and score around 160-170. Those pairs are the ones that you should be taking into account, not the ones that were lucky to get JGP event because there was not enough strong junior pairs last August. Not sure if you noticed, we are eight months later now and a lot has changed since then. In fact, the pairs I think will have most prospects are the ones created just before this past season, or the ones created during this season.

puremagic said:

Boikova/Kozlovski are the next Zabiyako/Enbert or Astakhova/Rogonov. Same average skating skills and no hopes for the titles. Australians are much better and it's obvious.
.

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Boikova/Kozlovski will have a pretty decent career if they are the next Zabijako/Enbert. Zabijako/Enbert are obviously not as good as Stolbova/Klimov and Tarasova/Morozov, but as Russian number 3 pair they do pretty well. I can't see any other country's pair number 3 qualifying to GPF and placing there 4th.

hanca said:

Boikova/Kozlovski will have a pretty decent career if they are the next Zabijako/Enbert. Zabijako/Enbert are obviously not as good as Stolbova/Klimov and Tarasova/Morozov, but as Russian number 3 pair they do pretty well. I can't see any other country's pair number 3 qualifying to GPF and placing there 4th.

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To be fair, Peng/Jin, China's #3, did qualify for the GPF, and while they placed 6th, they still qualified at #4. But I must say that I genuinely enjoyed Z/E's SP, especially at Worlds.

I am very very interested to see how this season plays out for the Russian Olympic Team. My dream teams are:

Ladies: Evgenia Medvedeva, Elena Radionova, Anna Pogorilaya (with Anna, I don't know what she can do to get on the team at this point--she could go clean all season and then have a meltdown at the Olympics, so who knows if even a podium finish at Nationals would secure her spot)
Men: Sergei Voronov, Mikhail Kolyada (Aliev as an alternate)
Dance: B/S, I/Z
Pairs: T/M, S/K, and Z/E (with a podium finish for S/K)

What is wrong with Polina?

ellej97 said:

What is wrong with Polina?

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According to her recent photos and getting two GP spots, I hope she's finally fine. Fingers crossed. Such a talent should shine.

My wish and predictions:

Ladies: Evgenia, Alina/Polina, Anna

Men: Mikhail Kolyada, Dmitriy Aliev

Pairs: T/M, S/K , Z/E

No predictions for Ice Dance.

Hannah555 said:

My wish and predictions:

Ladies: Evgenia, Alina/Polina, Anna

Men: Mikhail Kolyada, Dmitriy Aliev

Pairs: T/M, S/K , Z/E

No predictions for Ice Dance.

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My wish in ladies is quite complicated. Adelina and Julia already had one experience of Olympics, so I would prefer other skaters to get the opportunity too. That leaves us with Liza, Elena, Anna, Evgenia, Alina, Polina, and Maria. I don't feel that Liza have been motivated enough to fight the last season, which in my books makes her slightly less 'deserving'. That still leave me with Elena, Anna, Evgenia, Alina, Polina and Maria, and I honestly can't say who I would like to get the spots. They all work so hard ... my personal preference would be to leave Maria out (I don't think she can hold the nerves as well as the others, because her falls at the Europeans were very likely caused by nerves). That still leaves me with five skaters and I wish they could all go.