‘I nonetheless don’t consider it’: Comeback child Iliankova admits Olympic silver is ‘like gold’ to her after battling harm, squad exile

Former little one prodigy Anastasiia Iliankova was overwhelmed with emotion after the late entrant to the Russian Olympic Video games group gained silver on the uneven bars in Tokyo, finishing a outstanding comeback from harm and exclusion.

The 20-year-old creative gymnast’s highway to her 14.833 rating, which beat particular person gold medalist Suni Lee’s 14.500, was removed from clean.

A part of a gold-claiming junior group on the European Championships in 2016, her transition to senior stage was tough, with fixed again accidents stopping her from having the ability to practice and holding her restricted to the bars or bars and beam.

After a fourth-placed bars end on the world occasion in Montreal, she gained European Championships gold in 2019 earlier than an allergic response prevented her from having the ability to contest the bars closing on the European Video games.

Failing to qualify for the people, she was faraway from the ROC’s Olympics coaching squad however did not cease getting ready for the continued Video games.

She lastly secured her place in Japan courtesy of a third-place displaying within the Russian Cup in June, ending as the most effective of the six competing Russian gymnasts, and grew to become one of solely two from the squad within the high placings of the uneven bars closing on Sunday, with triple medalist Angelina Melnikova behind her in eighth.  

“I need to say thanks very a lot to everybody who believed and supported me,” she wrote on Instagram alongside prayer palms and a love coronary heart emoji.

“Because of the coaches, medical doctors, masseurs and my household. I nonetheless don’t consider it, but it surely occurred.”

Iliankova will now spend time contemplating her future, with retirement considered one of her choices after incomes a consequence that she says she would have taken earlier than the Video games.

Impressed by watching her compatriots beat the USA to gold within the group competitors, she then excelled on bars which weren’t her specialism when she was rising up.

“For me, this silver is like gold,” she advised Championat. “I dedicate the medal to the director of my sports activities college. He actually wished an Olympic medal – it was his dream.”

Belgian 21-year-old Nina Derwael took gold forward of Iliankova, with Lee settling for bronze.

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