Olympian Greg Rutherford has scathed the entourage of Kamila Valieva and likened the situation surrounding her doping scandal to "child abuse."
After playing a pivotal role in Russian winning team figure skating gold, Valieva, 15, tested positive for Trimetazidine.
Despite this development, a provisional suspension on her was lifted by the Russian Anti-Doping Agency [RUSADA], and the Court of Arbitration for Sport later cleared her to compete in Tuesday's individual event.
Rutherford won long jump gold at the London 2012 Summer Olympics and since retiring from athletics has switched to bobsleigh, although injury hindered his own bid to compete in Beijing.
Currently working as a pundit for discovery+, in a virtual press conference he labelled the Valieva saga "an incredibly difficult subject" and laid the blame firmly at the door of Russian officials.
"First and foremost she is a child and she’s been put in a position by people of power around her," he said.
"I think about what I was doing at 15 years of age, I was smoking and drinking and riding around on the roof of cars being an absolute idiot with no cares in the world. In fact, you don’t understand the world at that point.
"I borderline see what's happened to her as child abuse and if somebody has given her a drug without her knowledge, that's exactly what it is. I'm very keen for her not to be vilified in this."
Rutherford, 35, has long taken a stance that athletes who dope should face lifetime bans, but in this case, he believes that punishments should be directed elsewhere.
"This is different. This is a child," he added.
"A child is not at fault for this. A child does not go out and attempt to cheat at sport I don’t believe it, at 14 or 15, when this would have been going on? It doesn’t happen.
"We have to look at the people around her, we have to see and understand why this has happened and I hope they get to the bottom of it - because whoever has done this to her deserves to get in an awful lot of trouble."
The medal ceremony for the team event was promptly cancelled after news emerged of Valieva's failed test, and the International Olympic Committee confirmed that no medals will be awarded if she finishes in the top three of the individual event either - with the free skate routines taking place on Thursday.
And Rutherford admits that he feels for the other athletes affected.
"Irrespective of what has or hasn’t happened with her [Valieva], what we face is a situation where athletes are going for Olympic medals but won't have a chance to stand on a podium.
"As somebody who has stood on a podium in different positions - that is why you do it. For those moments to receive a medal, no matter what colour it is, see your flag, hear your national anthem, these athletes aren’t going to get it.
"I won two Olympic medals on my career and they were incredible moments. This is taking away from other athletes and I feel incredibly sorry for them."
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