People who insisted that Ruben Hayrapetyan was ‘forcedly’ keeping Henrikh Mkhitaryan in “Shakhtior”, and created a public movement entitled approximately “Save Heno from Nemets”, were truly concerned about the fate of our talented half-back, or simply wanted an extra time to act with a coat of “brave soldier’s justice”.
And when I was assuring that suchlike is not possible, that Henrikh Mkhitaryan does not need to be saved, I did not want to defend Ruben Hayrapetyan, I just did not want the deal to be failed because of stupid conversations, and our football player would not appear in ‘Liverpool’. Fortunately, everything seems to be successfully completed, and now the “defenders” of Henrikh are probably disappointed, this one “wave” to combat “for the sake of justice” will blow down.
And our sportsmen’s playing in the western high teams is a very positive phenomenon. In addition to individual development of football players, and benefiting the national team players, our guys get to know the organizational discipline, another approach to work, one step higher culture, which one way or another will bring to Armenia. When our politicians and commentators attack on Western values trying to convince us that they are hitting our national identity, I always bring the following example. Imagine that “Viva Cell” and “Orange” would not come to Armenia and only “ArmenTell” company would be. It is very likely that in that case we would have dusty, ragged, ill-equipped automatic telephone systems (ATS) with huge queues and the staff ‘mumbling’ to clients. So, whatever was present in the Soviet period. But since there are three operators, two Russian and one French companies, they had to follow the Western standards of work, and I have never noticed that queues are formed in their offices, that the staff is not smiling, and cash checks are not given to people.
The same is true if our players were to play only in the Armenian teams, and not see any life and any organization of the work beyond it, be satisfied only with local level teams. Will the national self – consciousness thus be protected? I doubt. It would go down to the level of a backward “bazar”, which is seen in many spheres.
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The Western values, thus, in my view, are not only broad thoughtfulness and tolerance, but also the attitude towards the work: strong self-organization, persistence for the execution of set goals without whining and pity towards own personality.
To make it clear what we are talking about, I quote from Henrikh Mkhitaryan: “My official agent deals with my transfers. As a professional player, I am not interested in the deals between my club and my agent. I have an official contract with my club and perform my duties … In the life of a professional player there are rules and I’m obliged to respect them.” Just like that, he is not interested in and performs his duties. It sounds strange to our ears, isn’t it? But, in my opinion, it is an example of the right attitude towards work.
ARAM ABRAHAMYAN
