Reason Why Evgeni Plushenko Is All Pissy

Just bad sportsmanship.  By Evgeni Plushenko and Russia.

Russia’s Olympic team came under political pressure at home Thursday to step up its performance at the Winter Games after a slow start that produced just three medals, one of them gold, in the first five days of competition in Canada.

Parliament speaker Boris Gryzlov, a leader of Prime Minister Vladimir Putin’s United Russia party, said anything less than a fourth-place finish in the final standings “would be a failure for those who are responsible for sports in our country” and could lead to their dismissal, Russia’s Ria-Novosti news agency reported.

Nationalist members of Parliament went a step further and demanded Leonid Tyagachev’s resignation as head of the Russian Olympic Committee, saying his continued leadership would doom the country to a poor showing when it hosts the 2014 Winter Games, in Sochi.

Russia is traditionally a powerhouse at the Winter Games, but some commentators say the team in Vancouver could be its weakest ever. At the end of Wednesday’s competition, Russia stood in 11th place in the medal standings, with one gold, one silver and one bronze.

Any finish in sixth place or lower would be its worst ever in the Winter Games.