I haven’t seen this mentioned, but if Trusova and her parents had agreed to train with Plushenko for just this past year and now the time had come to renew/renegotiate the agreement, maybe Plushenko was asking her to commit to his training team for a longer term than she/her parents felt comfortable committing to. (All that contract business he brought up after Kostornaia left him comes to mind.) Whereas, maybe Eteri’s school was happy to coach Trusova for the Olympic season and see what happens after that. Trusova may still want the flexibility of shopping around for the best coaching situation. If she wins the Olympics or even medals, her stock would be pretty high and another top coach besides Eteri (Plushenko is famous, but not yet for coaching success) may be happy to work with her post-Olympics. She may still be looking to play the long game, aiming to be part of more than one Olympic team. She said this year she wanted to skate until she’s 22. She might not have wanted to commit on a longer term basis to as untested a coach as Plushenko and lose perhaps a future opportunity to transfer to a coach like Mishin or Arutynyan. Or even to stay with Eteri, if that works well for her.