NEven before the ambulance can drive off, the camera allows a brief glimpse through the window pane of the interior of the vehicle: Ivan Fedotov, goalkeeper of the Russian national team, is lying helplessly on a stretcher with his knees bent and his long arm thrown over his head. The young man fixes a blank gaze on the ceiling. The future of the well-known athlete is more uncertain than ever – and the reason is not injury or illness, but military service.
As reported by Russian media, the 25-year-old was arrested in Saint Petersburg on Friday. The reason: Fedotov is said to have tried to avoid military service. The video, which shows the ice hockey player on the way to the hospital and circulates on social media, is said to have been taken directly in front of a recruitment office to which Fedotov had previously been taken under police escort. “Fedotov said that he was given some kind of injection that he didn’t know what it was,” his lawyer, Aleksey Ponomarev, told Russian media. “He was told that this had been prescribed by the doctor.”
