Even a few weeks after the end of the World Cup season, there is no peace in ski jumping. The reason for this is the suit scandal around the Norwegian team. Now one of the victims has spoken out – and has brought sharp criticism of the association and German media.
The World Cup season in ski jumping is over, but there is no peace. The scandal echoes too much for the manipulated suits around the Norwegian team. And while the investigation is still running, one of the five initially blocked athletes, Robin Pedersen, raises severe allegations against the FIS skiing association and German media.
“What we are accused of is not durable. All independent lawyers have found that they have nothing against us. I sewed my suits myself, so I know that everything is fine with them,” said Pedersen to the newspaper Ranablad and made a comparison to his Norwegian teammates Marius Lindvik and Johann André Forfang.
Robin Pedersen criticizes the world association FIS sharply
It “took five minutes to find mistakes on the suits of Marius and Johann in Trondheim, but a month to find something in the spring. I found it very strange that they (the FIS, note, editor ) told the media that they had found something in our suits,” added Pedersen. As a reminder: During the Nordic Ski World Cup in Trondheim, a video showed up that showed how the Norwegians’ suits were sewn. The top jumpers concerned and Lindvik were then closed during the World Cup.
Allegations against German media: “Try to capitalize”
A little later, Pedersen such as Kristoffer Eriksen Sundal and Robert Johansson suffered the same fate when the trio was preparing for the RAW-Air tour, the follow-up fight in Oslo-even though they had nothing to do with the previous scandal.
“We had completed a jump on the spar and after jumping on the way to the changing room when Robert received an email, in which he had been suspended,” said Pedersen and added: “I hadn’t even received an email. I had to call Jan-Erik Aalbu (Team manager, note of the editor) and ask what was going on. that was not possible because the association has blocked us. “
Pedersen also buttoned up the German press. Because in Norway there are rumors that German media have threatened with a TV boycott of the “RAW Air” tour should not be excluded from the World Cup. “They tried to make capital to get a few more medals. We three athletes are easy to acidify when it comes to millions of television rights,” he clarified.
At the beginning of April, after the end of the season, the provisional lock against Pedersen, Lindvik and Co. from FIS was lifted. But the matter is not forgotten. Pedersen said that they never had anything to do with fraud – and wrongly missed the last World Cup jumping. Johansson has already commented critically.
Ski jumping: Norwegian Pedersen scolds the world association
The mere fact that the investigation – contrary to the first statements of the FIS – still did not arise, agreed with him, said Pedersen and continued to scold: “The way FIS was dealt with with this case was horrific, they handled this situation very badly. The communication was completely lacking, they did not lack their own logs, it was impossible for us to follow something.”
Pedersen therefore accuses the World Association of arbitrariness. “You have the power. You control, who can jump, you check the equipment, you control the product. If there is anything that runs your wishes, you just make what you want. So it is very difficult to be only a game ball in this game. If there are many millions of income for the association or about urging us out of business, it is not so difficult for you to get out of business,” he said.