Tag: Olympic

The British Olympic Association (BOA) is planning to unite the England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland Football Associations in fielding a first Team GB men’s side since London 2012.

The Team GB women’s squad are eligible for qualification, but did not qualify for Paris 2024.

Great Britain entered a men’s team from every Games between 1948 to 1972 but were then met with resistance by Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, who felt their independence in FIFA and UEFA competitions could be jeopardised if they competed as a single team at the Olympics.

BOA chief executive Andy Anson said a Team GB men’s side at the US-hosted Games in four years would be “brilliant for football”.

“I think for the women’s team to compete is brilliant, and I’d love to see the men’s team compete in the same way,” he added.

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A Team GB men’s squad, featuring 13 English and five Welsh players, did compete for the host nation in what was seen as a one-off for the London Olympics in 2012.

In addition to the nations, the BOA could also face opposition from clubs, who may not be keen to release their players in a congested summer period.

The 2028 LA Olympics will take place between 14-30 July, just days after the Euro 2028 final at Wembley and a few weeks before the start of the new league season.

For the eighth time in Olympic history, Nigeria’s athletes will return home empty-handed, as Team Nigeria concluded its Paris 2024 Olympic campaign without a single medal on Saturday.

On Saturday, Hannah Reuben, Nigeria’s last hope, lost her second-round women’s freestyle wrestling match 5-2 to Mongolia’s Davaanasan Amar Enkh, sealing the country’s worst Olympic outing since London 2012.

Nigeria’s Olympic struggles date back to Helsinki in 1952, with subsequent disappointments in Melbourne in 1956, Rome in 1960, and a brief respite at Tokyo in 1964, where Nojeem Mayegun won Nigeria’s first Olympic medal. The drought continued in Mexico City in 1968, Moscow in 1980, and Seoul in 1988, before the latest disappointment in Paris.

After breaking the jinx at the 1964 Tokyo Games, Nigeria’s next Olympic medal was another bronze medal at the 1972 Olympic Games.

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Nigeria won two medals at the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics – a silver and a bronze. This was followed by a remarkable performance at the 1992 Barcelona Olympics, where the country won three silver and one bronze medal.

The 1996 Atlanta Olympics remains Nigeria’s best outing, with two gold, one silver, and three bronze medals.

In 2004, Nigeria won two bronze medals in Greece but improved its performance at the 2008 Beijing Olympics with three silver and two bronze medals.

Despite the lack of medals in Paris, there are positives to build upon as the 2028 Los Angeles Olympic Games countdown begins.

Nigeria showed improvement in athletics, with six finalists, up from four in Tokyo 2020 and two in Rio 2016.

Simone Biles could join an elite club of greatest female Olympians as she goes for titles eight and nine in the balance beam and floor exercise finals on the last day of artistic gymnastics competition at the Paris Games today.

The American phenom, who won team, all-around and vault golds in Paris, is the favourite on floor but not a shoe-in on beam, the apparatus where a mere centimetre of misjudgement can separate a medallist from last place.

If Biles wins both beam and floor, her nine Olympic golds will tie her with U.S. swimmer Katie Ledecky and Soviet gymnast Larisa Latynina for the most ever won by a female athlete.

Her beam challengers, teammate Sunisa Lee and Zhou Yaqin of China, are two of only three women who so far this year have performed a more difficult routine than Biles.

Zhou was the top beam qualifier with a 14.866, just 0.133 ahead of Biles, while third-placed qualifier Rebeca Andrade of Brazil has the lowest difficulty potential of the top four gymnasts but is known for her clean execution.

Only one of Lee’s three beam performances in Paris so far matched Biles’ in difficulty, but the fourth qualifier and all-around bronze medallist edged her star teammate on the apparatus in that competition.

Biles won beam bronze in the last two Olympics, including in Tokyo where she performed a modified routine without twisting, the source of the mental block that forced her to withdraw from most of those Games’ finals.

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Biles enjoys a difficulty advantage on the floor exercise with her signature tumbling, including a stratospheric double back flip with three twists, meaning the true race on the apparatus will most likely be for silver and bronze.

Contenders include Andrade, who could be saving difficulty upgrades for the final, Romania’s Sabrina Maneca-Voinea, who has performed the second most difficult routine so far in Paris, and American Jordan Chiles who qualified third ahead of Maneca-Voinea.

The male gymnasts conclude Olympic competition on Monday with finals on the parallel bars and horizontal bar.

China’s Zou Jingyuan seeks to retain his Tokyo gold, qualifying in first on parallel bars with a stunning 16.200, almost a point ahead of second-placed compatriot Zhang Boheng.

Zhang led the field on the horizontal bar in the preliminaries with 15.133, 0.533 ahead of fourth qualifier and 2020 silver medallist Tin Srbic of Croatia.

Lesotho taekwondo fighter, Michelle Tau, is eagerly anticipating her first fight at the ongoing 2024 Paris Olympics in France.

Though the global sporting event started in July, Tau will commence her quest for a medal on August 7. The southern African will become the first person to qualify for the Olympics in taekwondo in two decades from her country.

The athlete is carrying on what is regarded as a family legacy, with her late father—John Tau—who passed away when she was a young child—was a national taekwondo legend in Lesotho.

Tau, a former beauty queen, is confident that months of hard work and preparation will pay off with a podium finish in Paris.

“Everything is possible but it has not been easy to get to the Olympics. It requires a
lot of sacrifices but with determination, dedication, prayer and good support,
everything is possible,” noted Tau.

Tau has enjoyed the incredible support of Mchezo—A Rwanda-based company one of whose aims is ‘investing in the future of sport and technology in Africa’. The company has worked in partnership with the government of Lesotho, in supporting her during the qualification process for the Olympics.

Mchezo is a company focused on sports and talent development, responsible
gaming and innovation, with the aim of bringing dreams to life through diverse
development projects across the continent. As the betPawa brand owner in Africa,
the firm provides client services by offering a franchise to licence holders. Its vision is to ensure compliance, transparency, development of the sector (betting, payments and monitoring) and investment.

Mchezo helped Tau to attend top taekwondo trainings and programmes in
Germany and Spain, after she booked her ticket to Paris in the women’s under 49 kg category. She achieved the milestone through winning at the African qualifying tournament which held in Dakar, Senegal, early in February this year.

Her coach, Hugo Tortosa, 24, one of the youngest coaches at the Olympics, said that Tau’s training this week will comprise “very specific work to the first fight.”

“In taekwondo you can only think about the first opponent because if you do not pass that round you cannot compete further, so we can’t think about other opponents at this time,” Tortosa added.

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Managing Director of Mchezo, Ntoudi Mouyelo, said he could not be more proud of Tau’s achievement and has never doubted her talent.

“From the moment we were first introduced to her to this date, we at Mchezo havenever once doubted her drive to excel. It was very clear from the word go that she was a cut above the rest, the kind of sports personality anyone can enjoy working with,” Mouyelo said.

Tau, who is a role model in her country, has been part of the Lesotho national team since 2013. She serves as the Female Taekwondo Anti-Doping Ambassador for Lesotho and Africa—a role that essentially promotes the importance of athletes staying healthy and drug-free.

Apart from being a taekwondo champion, Tau is also a champion for women’s rights and makes it her mission to ensure that every girl and woman has the opportunity to learn how to defend themselves against gender-based violence.

Track and field takes centre stage at the Olympics today  with a swathe of stars on show, some of whose dreams will come true and others whose will be shattered .AFP Sports picks out five of the many duels to savour in the Stade de France:

Women’s 400 Metres Hurdles

 Femke Bol (NED) v Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone (USA):Probably the most keenly-anticipated potential match-up of the Games pits world champion Bol against the 24-year-old American who has dominated the event for the past three years.

“It’s inspirational and motivational how McLaughlin-Levrone’s racing and seeing how she’s raising the bar,” said 24-year-old Bol earlier this month.

The Dutchwoman has twice taken minor medals behind the world record holder – a bronze in Tokyo and silver at the 2022 worlds – but she certainly comes to Paris race-fit whereas the American has been sparing in her appearances.

Bol can take heart that no-one has successfully defended the title – Deon Hemmings and Dalilah Muhammad going closest in winning silver at the Games after their moment of glory. But McLaughlin-Levrone has shown she is all about making history.

Women’s 200 metres

 Shericka Jackson (JAM) v Gabby Thomas (USA):Jackson has shed the 100m and bet the house on the 200m to at last win an Olympic individual gold after two bronzes at 400m and 100m in Rio and Tokyo respectively. A worrying injury close to the Games may have forced her hand but the 30-year-old probably needs all her reserves to handle Thomas.

The Jamaican knows how to handle pressure for she has two 200m world titles to her credit whereas Thomas, 27, has something to prove after taking bronze in Tokyo and then silver at the worlds behind Jackson last year.

Thomas has been in far better form than Jackson this year but the Harvard graduate is expecting the old warrior to turn up primed and ready for what could well be her last tilt at individual Olympic gold.

 “It means a lot, I don’t have an individual Olympic gold medal,” said Jackson.

Men’s 100 metres

 Marcell Jacobs (ITA) v Noah Lyles (USA):This is a fascinating clash between the mercurial Italian and the livewire American – the former defending his surprising title from Tokyo and the latter trying to rubber-stamp the image of himself as the rightful successor to Usain Bolt.

The two could not be more of a contrast physically – Jacobs is all muscles while Lyles has remained lithe, but on form since the Olympics the American is odds-on favourite.

However, Jacobs has shrugged off a series of injuries and illnesses that have bedevilled him since Tokyo. Lyles took advantage by winning 100m-200m gold at the world championships last year.

Jacobs, 29, threw down the gauntlet in winning the European title in June and if in top form Lyles’ claim to Bolt’s mantle may receive a jolt of reality.

 “I worked really hard to get here to win again… so I can do the double,” said Jacobs.

Men’s 400m hurdles

 Karsten Warholm (SWE) v Rai Benjamin (USA):Warholm has been the leading man and Benjamin never quite a scene-stealing supporting actor in one of athletics’ most enthralling rivalries of the past few years.

From the 2019 world championships in Doha to the Tokyo Games where he broke the world record in stunning fashion – the American also did in a valiant losing effort – and Budapest last year the 28-year-old Warholm has shown Benjamin a clean set of heels.

Benjamin, though, perhaps landed a psychological blow when he beat Warholm in the Monaco Diamond League meeting in July.

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“Paris is going to be madness,” said Benjamin. “I have to win there. I believe I can do it.”

Men’s Shot Put

 Ryan Crouser (USA) v Joe Kovacs (USA):The field event that World Athletics president Sebastian Coe savours could turn into quite a duel between the two American rivals.

Kovacs, 35, is four years older than Crouser so this is probably his final chance to secure an elusive Olympic gold – and deny his compatriot a historic third title.

Kovacs claimed Crouser was beatable and blamed having to cope with a new-born baby last year for disrupting his preparations for the Budapest world championships.

His excuse rang hollow given Crouser produced a stunning performance to take gold less than three weeks after being diagnosed with deep vein thrombosis.

Crouser has been laid low by injuries this season too and is philosophical about how he will cope today.

 “The best analogy is this – it’s like an airplane where we’re all loaded up, and everything’s ready to go,” he said.“We just have a short runway. It’s tough to know exactly where I’m at.” 

Olympic 100m champion Marcell Jacobs said  he is a “changed, but better” athlete and is confident of defending his title at the Paris Games.

The Italian stunned the field to snatch gold in the Covid-delayed Tokyo Olympics, in a European record of 9.80sec.

He made it double gold just days later by helping Italy to victory in the 4x100m relay.

The 29-year-old told reporters he was back at the Summer Games for one reason only: to defend his title in one of its standout events.

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 “I’m the Olympic champion. I want to win again,” Jacobs told reporters. “I know what I can do. I know I am the Olympic champion. I won the 100m at the Olympic Games. I worked really hard to get here to win again… so I can do the double.”

After his stunning success in Tokyo, Jacobs went off the radar, citing fatigue and a knee problem.

His conspicuous absence raised eyebrows and brought criticism that still stings.

 “What hurt me was that people didn’t understand that we are not robots, we are not machines. We are human,” he said.

 “We work every day at 100% with our body, so it’s normal to have some difficulties, some injury.

 “The problem with doping (accusations) after the Olympics didn’t touch me because I know what I have to do to get a win, so I know what is not true.

 “It’s hard to survive at the Olympics and win, but it’s harder to continue to win.

 “So for that, you have a lot of injury and people didn’t understand that.

 “In Italy, we never had an Italian guy make the Olympic final, but I won and they continued to criticise me. So it hurt me.”

Jacobs showed his determination to bag back-to-back golds by upending his life, both professionally and personally, changing coach in Olympic year and moving, with his family, to the United States to work under Rana Reider.

It seems to have paid off as Jacobs claimed a second European title in Rome in June.

“Of course I’ve changed since Tokyo,” he said. “It was three years ago.”

Since then, Jacobs added, “I win, I lose, I have a lot of injury. I change everything. I change country and change coach, so I’m different, but I’m better”.

Jacobs maintained that reaching Sunday’s 100m final was the hardest part of the jigsaw.

 “The most difficult thing is the semi-final because we are this year 15 or 16 guys who can go to the final. The semi-final will be hard,” he said.

 “Every year is a different, every year there are some people who can run really fast. This year we have the Jamaicans, the Americans, but every year is like that.

 “In Tokyo it was like everybody can wait for the silver medal because the gold was being prepared for Trayvon Bromell.

 “He ran 9.76sec at the beginning of the season, but he didn’t even make the final so you never know. The Olympics are different.”

Jacobs concluded: “But it will be fun because there are a lot of guys who can run really fast, but only one can win, and on Sunday we’ll know!”

Scottie Scheffler is hoping to crown a brilliant season with a “special” gold medal as the golf world number one prepares to tee off at his first Olympics.

The American has won six PGA Tour titles this year, including his second Masters green jacket and his second Players Championship trophy.

Scheffler will head into Thursday’s opening round of the men’s Olympic event at Le Golf National, the venue for the 2018 Ryder Cup, as one of the favourites.

“It’s not very often you get to compete in the Olympics, so to be able to have a medal for the rest of your life would be very special,” the 28-year-old said. “If I don’t, my life is certainly not going to end but it would be extremely special to have a gold medal and it’s definitely one of the reasons why I’m here this week.

“I loved going to watch table tennis yesterday but that’s not why I showed up. I try to place an equal amount of value to all the tournaments I play.”

Golf returned to the Olympics for the 2016 Rio Games after a 112-year absence, but several top players pulled out of the tournament in Brazil.

Many stars blamed fears surrounding the Zika virus, although Rory McIlroy said he did not think the sport belonged in the Games and that he would not even watch it.

The Northern Irishman had changed his tune by the time of the Covid-delayed Tokyo Olympics three years ago and will also compete in France.

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“I think there have always been weird situations surrounding the Olympics – the first one with Zika virus, and last one with Covid being a factor. I think that certainly had an effect on the Games,” said Scheffler.

“And this year kind of being the first one where it will be fairly normal.”

Scheffler is part of a formidable USA team also featuring reigning champion Xander Schauffele, Wyndham Clark and Collin Morikawa.

Schauffele is expected to be his biggest threat for gold after shedding his nearly-man tag in golf’s biggest events with his maiden major title at this year’s PGA Championship, before lifting another at the British Open earlier this month.

“I love seeing people like him (Schauffele) have success because he does it the right way – he works hard,” added Scheffler, who will be the first man to play in the Olympic golf while world number one.

“He’s not full of himself. We were playing a practice round today and I was actually thinking about it like, ‘Man, Xander is the exact same today after winning tournaments as he was if he had lost the tournament by one’.”

The Olympic flame   has arrived the  French soil at the port of Marseille on board a 19^th  century ship in front of 150,000 spectators for a ceremony that posed a first major test for organisers ahead of the 2024 Paris Games.

Olympic gold medal-winning swimmer Florent Manaudou carried the torch from the deck of the Belem, a three-masted vessel which had transported it from Greece.

Manaudou passed the torch to Paralympic champion sprinter Nantenin Keita, who handed it to French rapper Jul to light a cauldron.

As the Belem entered Marseille’s Old Port surrounded by hundreds of small boats, planes from the Patrouille de France display team swooped overhead tracing the Olympic rings in the sky before they returned to paint the red, white and blue of the French flag in the air.

Fireworks go off as the 19th century sailing ship Belem carrying the Olympic flame enters Marseille’s Old Port

Fireworks also tore into the sky as the Belem docked after its 12-day voyage from Greece, where the flame was lit in Olympia on April 16.

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The arrival of the flame marks the start of a 12,000-kilometre (7,500-mile) torch relay across France and its far-flung overseas territories.

Organisers are hoping the first public spectacle of the Games on French soil – just 79 days from an opening ceremony that will take place on the river Seine – will help build excitement after a row about ticket prices and concerns about security.

“It’s something we’ve been waiting for a very long time,” chief organiser Tony Estanguet said on Monday, referring to the 100 years since Paris last staged the Games. “The Games are coming home.”

France, which was also the host in 1900, sees itself at the heart of the modern Olympic movement after a French aristocrat, Pierre de Coubertin, revived the idea of the Games as practised by the Greeks until the 4th century BC.

After the Covid-hit edition in Tokyo in 2021 and the corruption-tainted Rio de Janeiro Games in 2016, the Paris Olympics are seen as an important moment for the sporting extravaganza.

• Purity urges  lifters  to replicate Africa Games’ feat

Nigeria’s Wrestler, Blessing Oborodudu said  she has  shifted her attention to the African Championships and the Olympic Games Qualifiers in Alexander, Egypt.

The two-time Commonwealth Games Champion and Olympic Silver medallist who won a gold medal at the ongoing African Games, said  she  has switched to the Olympics qualifiers because the Paris Olympic Games is just around the corner.

The Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games silver medallist was grateful to the Nigeria Wrestling Federation President, Daniel Igali for support and the tireless efforts of her coaches, and teammates.

“I came to the African Games to improve on my position. My plan is never to give any point away to anybody. I want to thank the NWF President, Daniel Igali for his endless support, coaches, teammates and others that pushed me to this level,” Oborodudu said. “The next competition is the African Championship and the Olympic Qualifiers. It has not been easy to maintain the winning streak. It comes from consistency, perseverance and dedication.”

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Nigeria’s Wrestling head coach Purity Akuh has disclosed he was not surprised the female wrestlers won all the six gold medals available for the women’s event even as he challenged  them to repeat the feat at the African Championships and the Olympic Qualifiers.

He hailed  Nigeria Wrestling Federation President Daniel Igali who ensured all the wrestlers were camped in Yenagoa, Bayelsa State over two months before the start of the African Games and ensured they participated in competitions held in Croatia and France earlier in the year.

“It is so amazing. I said it in my earlier interview that we would take six out of six gold medals for the women’s event. We worked so hard and with the support of our President Daniel Igali, we have been in camp and he has been encouraging us,” Akuh noted.

“We started our preparations since last year and we were Croatia and France for pre- tournament competitions. I was not too surprised we took all the six gold medals.”