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PARIS: France will look to its swimmers and judokas
to fuel their medals drive at the Beijing Olympics as they aim to at
least match the seventh-place finish with 11 golds they achieved in
Athens four years ago.
The Greek capital saw the arrival
on the scene of the multi-talented 17-year-old Laure Manoudou, who
captured gold in the 400m freestyle, silver in the 800m freestyle
and bronze in the 100m backstroke.
Since then she has developed into
one of the most dominant female swimmers in the world, but her form
has suffered lately amid ongoing problems with boyfriends and
training facilities.
Conversely, sprinter Alain
Bernard has emerged as a potential star of the Games having broken
both the world 50m and 100m freestyle records at the European
Championships in Eindhoven in March.
Bernard will headline a French
4x100m freestyle relay team that has real hopes of upsetting the
Americans and Australians and the French have two or three other
swimmers who have high hopes of making the podium.
In contrast to the pool, the
prospects look dismal in athletics where the French suffered the
embarrassment of coming away empty-handed from last year’s World
Championships in Osaka, Japan.
After years of carrying French
hopes on the track, sprinters Christine Aaron and Muriel Hurtis are
both entering the veteran stage, while 110m hurdler Ladji Doucoure,
the 2005 World Champion, has struggled with injuries for the last
year.
Best chances in the National
Stadium will likely come from Mehdi Bala in the 1500m and Romain
Mesnil in the pole vault, a discipline which is a long-time French
speciality.
French secretary of state for
sports Bernard Laporte has made it clear the country’s Olympic
team must stop its slide down the overall country rankings by
targeting 40 medals in Beijing. The French won a total of 33 in
Athens.
“It’s now been two Olympics
that we’ve regressed,” said the former national rugby union
coach. “We were fifth in Atlanta (in 1996), sixth in Sydney (in
2000) and seventh in Athens (in 2004).
“We’re hoping to keep seventh
place and to do that you basically have to win 40 medals.”
To achieve that the French will
look to their traditional fiefdoms of judo, cycling and fencing to
keep the medal tally ticking over.
--AFP
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