28-year-old Vadym Matveiev lives in Kamianske, Dnipropetrovsk region. He is a professional athlete. He played rugby for seven consecutive years for the Dnipro rugby club. But everything changed with the beginning of the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine. All rugby matches stopped, and some of the team’s players went off to fight. Vadim was among them.

The athlete first volunteered and helped his friends, and then he joined one of the battalions of the People’s Liberation Army. Later, Vadym began to fight in the ranks of the 3rd separate assault brigade and from the beginning of the year performed combat missions in Bakhmut.

In April, during one of the operations, Vadym was seriously injured and almost lost his arm. A fellow traumatologist in Dnipro helped to save it. Later, Vadym underwent several operations and is currently engaged in rehabilitation. According to the doctors, the athlete will not be able to move with his left hand as before. Therefore, he is already considering how he will continue to do sports.