Russia names Olympic squad despite ban threat

MOSCOW: Russia’s Olympic Committee pressed on Wednesday with its preparations for the Rio Olympic Games despite the threat of a ban for state-run doping hanging over the country.

At a meeting in Moscow the executive board approved a 387-strong team — including star names like pole vaulter Yelena Isinbayeva, hurdler Sergei Shubenkov and tennis player Svetlana Kuznetsova — to compete at this summer’s games starting on August 5. The team’s line-up includes the 68 track and field athletes, whose fate hinges on the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) in Lausanne, which is set to rule on Thursday on whether the IAAF had grounds to impose a blanket ban on Russia’s athletics federation.

“We today confirmed the composition of our team including the track and field athletes,” committee chief Alexander Zhukov told the press.

“The court decision will likely be tomorrow and tomorrow we will find out.”

Zhukov insisted that Russian sportsmen were still “capable of competing for medals” at the event in Rio and said they were training in Russia, Portugal and Brazil.

The preparations come despite a mammoth scandal that sees Russia under threat of a blanket Olympic ban following bombshell allegations of state-controlled cheating. An independent WADA commission led by Canadian investigator Richard McLaren detailed an elaborate cheating scheme run by Russia’s sports ministry with help from the FSB state intelligence agency.

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) said it would study “legal options” before deciding whether to ban Russia from the Rio Games following emergency talks on Tuesday.