I will officially be pissed at you if your premonitory vision brings something like this to our poor eyes. Don‘t you dare!
Zhenya made a mistake at Euros, wasn‘t looking her best, not skating clean and coming back from an injury while Alina was absolutely perfect. I guess people just didn‘t expect this to happen again because Zhenya is known for her consistency whereas Alina made multiple mistakes in the GP series so they kind of didn‘t expect her to bring two flawless performances again. And there‘s still the thing with the PCS and whatever. Zhenya was their queen for 2 seasons, twice World champion in a row and all that while Alina was coming straight from juniors. It‘s just to be expected. I was surprised by her win, too. So, while I think it‘s understandable and natural that the Russians were surprised by her win, they could have reacted a bit... better to it. In the end Alina is an athlete who gave two almost flawless performances and won the first gold for their country, not someone who sneaked in and stole Zhenya‘s medal.