Off Topic Olympics

  • Please bear with us on the new site integration and fixing any known bugs over the coming days. If you can not log in please try resetting your password and check your spam box. If you have tried these steps and are still struggling email [email protected] with your username/registered email address
  • Log in now to remove adverts - no adverts at all to registered members!
Chazz Rheinhold said:
Interesting article


SKY BRONZE IS RESULT OF RUTHLESS RECRUITMENT
Nobody had to recruit Sarah Hardcastle to swim for Great Britain at the 1984 Olympic Games. She was an extraordinarily gifted athlete, who happened also to still be a pupil at Shoeburyness High School in Southend-on-Sea. She won silver and bronze in Los Angeles and was, until this week, the youngest British medallist at the summer Olympics.

Not the youngest British Olympic medallist, because that was Cecilia Colledge, a figure skater who won silver at the 1936 winter Games. She wasn’t recruited either. She was born and lived in London, where her father was a surgeon, eminent in the field of throat cancer. There is still a substantial fellowship fund in the family name at the Royal College of Surgeons of England.

Yet these Olympians, Hardcastle and Colledge, will now be erased from the record books and replaced by Sky Brown, who has become the youngest British Olympic medallist with a bronze in the women’s park skateboarding. And Brown most certainly was recruited to this country’s cause because she was born in Japan, and lives in Japan, apart from those months when she resides in the United States. And she is a wonderful athlete; courageous and competitive, but with the winning demeanour and energy of a supremely gifted 13-year-old.

You must log in or register to see images

Sky Brown won a bronze medal at the Women's Park Skateboarding final in Tokyo
Yet there remains an element of expediency about her Britishness. It is her father’s nationality, so there is no question she qualifies. But Brown was targeted after she impressed as a nine-year-old at a competition in Bath. Great Britain scouted her; otherwise she would compete for Japan. Probably.

Japan won gold and silver in Brown’s event in Tokyo. One of the girls, second-placed Kokona Hiraki, was even younger, just 12. And Japan have five of the world’s top 10 female park skaters; and two of the top five street skaters. As a British athlete, Brown has no competition. Her nearest rival, Bombette Martin, is ranked 27th in the world. The explanation for Brown’s recruitment is that Team GB were more relaxed, and that appealed.

Yet how relaxed do you have to be if you’re out poaching children of primary school age? Team GB can hardly play the cool uncle. Behind that cheery, laid-back façade is a ruthless recruitment programme that will lose nationality in the paperwork if there’s a medal in it. And without young Sky they’re nowhere.

You may find this mean-spirited. Our medallist is 13. Who would begrudge a 13-year-old girl this moment of pure joy and wonder? Yet Hardcastle was 15. Just because she’s 52 now does not mean she wasn’t immensely proud of her record. Angie Thorp was utterly distraught when her British 100metres hurdles record was broken by Tiffany Porter, recruited by Team GB once it became apparent she wasn’t going to make the American team.

The first British medallist on skis is Izzy Atkin, an American teenager when she was recruited, later landing a milestone achievement that would have been truly special had it been recorded by an athlete who genuinely came from a country that didn’t have significant winter sports facilities — unlike Massachusetts or Utah, where Atkin spends her time.

You must log in or register to see images

Brown represented Team GB despite spending most of her time in Japan or the US
Perhaps you think none of this matters. Perhaps it’s just about the medals, and the resultant funding. Team GB is not alone in exploiting the shifting sands of modern nationality.

In a globalised world, so much is grey. Mark Bullingham, the Football Association chief executive, says that 80 per cent of the young players in England’s age group teams have dual nationality. And Sarah Hardcastle’s daughter, Eve Thomas, competed at the 2021 Olympics but for New Zealand, because the family emigrated there when she was three.

It’s complicated, true. All the more reason, then, to fight hard to preserve the sanctity of international sport, and what sets it apart: the best of ours versus the best of yours. It’s not just about where you’re at; it really should be where you’re from, too.
Click to expand...

Another good article from Martin Samuel telling it like it is.
 
  • Like
Reactions: balkan tiger
Yes, the Italian National Anthem is very good, but who is sick of hearing it this summer? Bastards!
edit:
OK, when all four of the 4X100m gold medal winners sang it with gusto on the podium I was slightly misty-eyed.
 
Last edited:
Kempton said:
Where does your obsession with Martin Samuel come from Castro? Is he from Norwich or Brid?

Do you have a crush on the hairy one?
Click to expand...

I appreciate people who are good at their job. Others are happy with mediocrity it seems. Is that a Hull thing. A quick check would probably confirm he is from London.
You seem to be intimidated by Norwich. A justifiable inferiority complex?
 
Barchullona said:
I appreciate people who are good at their job. Others are happy with mediocrity it seems. Is that a Hull thing. A quick check would probably confirm he is from London.
You seem to be intimidated by Norwich. A justifiable inferiority complex?
Click to expand...

No, not at all. The Norwich thing is just another thing you bring up time and time again, as is having another dig at Hull.

You've been doing it for years and I just wondered why you feel the need to be so repetitive.

I find it a little bit weird, that's all.
 
  • Like
Reactions: SW3 Chelsea Tiger, Mr Hatem and Newland Tiger
Anal Frank Fingers said:
So how do you feel about, say, the England football team and their allowing "foreigners" to play,? Two off the top of my head ... Raheem Sterling and Terry Butcher. I assume you disagree with them too.

You must really hate cricket also.
Click to expand...

Butcher was born abroad where his father was working but brought up here. He is not a foreigner by any stretch of the imagination. Sterling came here when he was 5. The skateboarding lass has never been in this country and it was a convenience as she would have been way down the pecking order to get in the Japan or USA teams. Similar with Budd and her reasons for running for us. Sterling went for the harder option as he would have been a shoe in for Jamaica.
Wouldn't know about cricket as I have no interest in it. Don't agree with what happens in rugby either, both codes, where players seem to be able to choose to play for whoever they like.
 
Lauren Price Middleweight women boxing.... what a star.... get this former international footballer, former kick boxing world champion, then saw Nicola Adams in Rio 2012 and thought, I can do that and is now Olympic Champion. and ranked 1 in the world... Brought up by her grandparents from 3 days old.... kudos!!!!
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: Howden Tigress, Kempton, SW3 Chelsea Tiger and 1 other person
This is moderately interesting, it lists GB medals won and funding for the olympic sports. It's a bit rough and ready because it doesn't differentiate between gold, silver and bronze and there is always the pandemic factor but it does suggest that rowing, canoeing and hockey need to be looked at quite closely. Weightlifting's good value for money though!

You must log in or register to see images
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top Bottom
Back