The President of the Ukrainian Basketball Federation, Mikhail Brodsky, commented on the statement of the President of “Prometheus” about his refusal to participate in the Ukrainian championship. Autumn seems to be hot in Ukrainian basketball…

“I personally see Mr. Dubinsky’s appeal to the basketball community as a false insult and blackmail against me and the entire Ukrainian Basketball Federation. I do not want to go into details – I am disgusted, but as for why Prometheus had to pay an additional 4.5 million in addition to the usual contribution of 40 thousand hryvnia, I will now tell you in detail.

I will say right away, in the 30-year history of Ukrainian basketball, he has seen many like Dubinsky, neither the first nor the last.

It all started when the Ukrainian Basketball Federation applied to the Champions League for Prometheus to participate in this tournament and discussed this issue with him before. After that, Mr. Dubinsky called me and unexpectedly asked me to play in the ULEB Cup. Everyone understands that this is an unofficial organization that does not cooperate with FIBA ​​and is a private tournament. Frankly, I did not support this request and it infuriated me to say the least. Since spring, FBU has been working with FIBA ​​on the preferential participation of our teams in European Championships and international tournaments under the auspices of this organisation. In fact, the entire basketball system in Ukraine is built under the FIBA ​​vertical. At the same time, our national champion, who had previously applied for participation in the Champions League, still enters the ULEB Cup – this is a clear spit in the direction of FIBA ​​and FBU.

We publicly apologized to FIBA, and I personally met with FIBA-Europe President Turgay Demirel at the European Championship. Of course, Prometheus has nothing to do with this and the image of Ukrainian basketball. I understand that today the club does not want to play in the Ukrainian championship, it is much more comfortable for them in the Latvian-Estonian league. “Prometheus” got its name thanks to money bags, but money can’t buy everything! It seems that Pan Dubinsky did not understand this.

They wanted to buy Ukrainian clubs playing in the Super League and influence the situation in the championship and even the Executive Board, this was the next step of the “bosses”. To buy, of course, is said out loud – to throw a statement in the amount of one million hryvnia. At first there were three clubs that should have received money from Prometheus but I think that was just the beginning.

Later, “Prometheus” entered the aforementioned Latvian-Estonian league, and stories began in the summer about its magnificent budget of 200 million hryvnia in the Baltic states! Ainars (Bagatskis) hires me and says that the Prometheus people are roaming in Riga and scaring everyone, that they will “scatter” the club’s budget in half and cut everyone here to “-40”. This is a time when we are asking the Latvian authorities for help in organizing a National Team training camp for us. And in general, in a war these are very false statements. By the way, even now no one bothers Prometheus to fulfill his promise and help Zaporozhye, Mykolaiv and Kryvbas.

In light of the above, the FBU Executive Committee voted for an additional contribution of 4.5 million hryvnia to the Ukrainian Championship for Prometheus as a parallel playing club in the European Cup tournament, which is not held under the auspices of FIBA. By the way, Budivelnik entered a legitimate tournament – the Champions League, where they will represent Ukraine and Ukrainian basketball, for which I am very grateful to the club. The Executive Committee also decided that the full amount of additional contributions from Prometheus will help Ukrainian clubs qualify for the Ukrainian Championship. Personally, this amount is too small for the current situation, I think Dubinsky would draw 100 million.

Another curious moment. For several years now, FBU has been moving towards transparency in doing business in professional sports. We asked the FBU to issue the Prometheus players contracts. Dubinsky, as expected, ignored this. At the same time, “Glory to Ukraine! Glory to the Armed Forces of Ukraine!” – what is behind it. And behind it is the budget of the club 200,000 million hryvnia, which he won in Ukraine thanks to the Ukrainians, which he will spend abroad in tournaments that the Ukrainian fans and he cannot enter. Why – let him explain. I think if Prometheus had given the players contracts to the fans, Mr. Dubinsky’s personal It would be very interesting if men from the Armed Forces of Ukraine died for their ambitions.

Now Prometheus has three things to do: pay a fee of 40,000 hryvnia for participation in the championship, pay an additional fee of 4.5 million hryvnia and secure the players’ contracts. And then Mr. Dubinsky can have as much fun as he wants. He is apparently allowed to do so because he has an important “roof” if he allows himself such disclosures. We saw his behavior without a roof, ”said Brodsky.