Many Italian competitors, e.g. Goggia, Vinatzer, Wierer etc. In my opinion Colturi could start for Italy and have the same money now as with the Albanian flag. I doubt if the Albanian ski federation is very rich, since their entire sport is weak, let alone winter sports.
Ceccarelli wanted to take money from the federation and train daughter in her team. The federation didn`t want to agree to this, because we are talking about a 16-year-old girl at the time. Private teams have stars with recognized achievements, e.g. Brignone or Goggia (they also trained in junior teams at the age of 16). In my opinion, Ceccarelli could have collected money from private funds, after all, with such successes of her daughter it wouldn`t be a problem. Tina Maze also separated from Slovenia at some point and created her own team. In a situation in which Colturi would start to achieve successes, then the federation should start to finance her team more + private sponsors. For me it`s simple.
I think that It's a similar situation with Braahten in Norway but there are some differences:
- he's an adult,
- his mother is Brazilian,
- Norway has a lot of talent in technical events (although of course it's always better to have 1 more than 1 less).
Well, we lived through Caroline Wozniacki representing Denmark and there was some talk if she could switch to Poland early on but she said no since she lived her entire life in Denmark anyway. But she was very popular here. On the other side Angelique Kerber who also has Polish ancestry actually lived in Poland on her grandfather's estate (which was a tennis academy). In the last few years except Eugenia Bujak (cycling) switching to Slovenia due to a conflict with the federation we don't really have such cases. I can understand many Italians have their opinion on Colturi & her mother alas it's boosted by the lack of other top end prospects in your skiing now (and some other winter sports). I'm surprised Italian journalists haven't figured out what's behind Colturi's switch already because it has to be money or "personal differences" either way.
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