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| Saturday, September 16, 2000, Chandigarh, India   
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Paes, Bhupathi get tough draw Will Thorpe make history?
The cold war is over, let the Olympic battles begin! |
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Baboor drawn to meet easy rivals Oldest Olympian,
war veteran at ceremony Cathy Freeman
lights Olympic flame Pakistan face injury scare Koreas march together Shooters to win
first medals IOC praises opening ceremony Athletes take
anti-drug pledge Kiwis rattle Zimbabwe Jeev set to make comeback
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SYDNEY, Sept 15 (PTI) —
India go into their Millennium Olympic Games campaign in right earnest tomorrow, after today’s opening ceremony, carrying big hopes of striking a medal in men’s hockey while in other disciplines the luck of the draw seems to have gone against them. Since making their debut at the pinnacle of sports competitions in 1928 at Amsterdam, India have garnered eight gold (a record for one single discipline), one silver and two bronze medals in men’s hockey besides one bronze medal each in wrestling and men’s tennis — altogether a very modest haul. India are once again looking up to the hockey team to provide the country with another Olympic medal, hopefully even a gold, while the crack men’s doubles combine of Leander Paes and Mahesh Bhupathi are unfortunate to have drawn the redoubtable “Woodies”, the Australian top seeds, as their likely second-round opponents in tennis. Iron women Sanamacha Chanu (53 kg class) and former world champion Karnam Malleswari (69 kg) are two other competitors who seem to have the potential to rise to the medals podium. In other disciplines, especially in badminton where national champion Pullela Gopichand and Aparna Popat are in the fray, the luck of the draw seems to have deserted the Indians. Coming back to hockey, which remains India’s major medal hope, it is good to see the team members sporting a relaxed look here unlike in the past when they caved in under the pressure of huge expectations. India face very tough opponents in Argentina, who beat them 1-0 at Atlanta in their lung-opener and sent them tumbling down to their worst ever finish (8th), this time too in their group B campaign opener on Sunday and then follow it up with clashes against the strongly fancied Australia, 1996 runners-up Spain and Asian champions South Korea. Chief coach Vasudevan Baskaran has told his players to take the field with a positive frame of mind and that the “rest would follow,” for the Bangkok Asian Games champions. Tennis heroes Paes, India’s flag-bearer at the opening ceremony, and his partner Mahesh, who reached here today along with their coach Ramesh Krishnan, clearly have their task cut out if they aim to clutch a medal in men’s doubles. They will be up against Aussie aces Mark Woodforde and Todd Woodbridge, who have drawn a first-round bye, if they get past their opening round rivals — the unfancied Romanian pair of Andrei Pavel and Gabiel Trifu. However, the rest of the way to the medal round for the Indians, who had won two Grand Slam titles last year and reached every grand slam final before their well-known split-up, seems to be an easy one once they get past the legendary “Woodies”. In singles, 1996 bronze medallist Paes runs headlong into Swede Mikael Tillstrom in the opening round. In the women’s doubles, India’s wild card entrants Nirupama Vaidyanathan and Manisha Malhotra, who are expected here today, will also find the going tough after being pitted against sixth seeds Jelena Dokic and Rennae Stubbs of Australia in the opening round. Fortune seems not to have favoured two other Indian medal hopes — shuttlers Gopichand and Aparna. Tenth-ranked, Hyderabad-based Gopi, who has secured a bye in the first round, meets Vladislav Druzchenko of Ukraine, who is known to be a tough customer, in his opening encounter. If he gets past the Ukrainian rival, whom he has never met previously in a match, Gopi will be up against second-seeded Hendrawan of Indonesia in the third round. “The draw could have been better and could have been worse too. I don’t look so much at the draw and like to take each match as it comes,” the ace Indian shuttler said and added he would go into the fray with a strategy in mind. The new millennium has been a rough one for Aparna too who had to serve a three-month International Badminton Federation (IBF)-imposed ban for taking a medicine for cold earlier this year. The former world junior runner-up and 1998 Kuala Lumpur Commonwealth Games silver medallist is drawn to meet her conqueror on two occasions in the Malaysian capital, Britain’s Kelly Morgan, in her first encounter here. But Aparna, born in Mumbai and now with the Prakash Padukone Academy in Bangalore, is a very talented and gritty player and is capable of pulling off an upset win over Morgan. In boxing, light-flyweight Soubam Suresh Singh will be the first Indian to enter the ring against Korean Kim Ki-Suk in the 48 kg class on Sunday. On the next day it will be the turn of middleweight Jitender Kumar, the second boxer in the four-man squad and silver medallist at the 1998 Kuala Lumpur Commonwealth Games, to take on Donald Grant Orr of Canada. This year’s Arjuna awardee Gurcharan Singh, 1997 Asian championship and 1998 Asian Games bronze medal winner, will match his wits against another Korean Choi Ki-Soo in the light heavyweight (81 kg) category on September 20. Boxing hero of the Bangkok Asian Games, bantamweight Ngangom Dingko Singh, will be the last to enter the ring and is drawn to meet Ukraine’s Sergiy Danylchenko in the first round. The boxers, keeping themselves away from the limelight following the controversy regarding their fitness, have been going through their paces quietly. The national boxing federation chief and Indian contingent’s Chef-de-Mission, Ashok Mattoo, has also been taking pains to reiterate that the quartet is in fine shape. In table tennis, all three members of the squad here-India No 1 and Kuala Lumpur Commonwealth Games bronze medallist Chetan Baboor, national champion S Raman and women’s national champion Poulomi Ghatak — have to get through their preliminaries. Baboor, India’s lone entrant in men’s singles, is placed in group C with Petr Korbel of the Czech Republic, whom he meets on September 17, and New Zealand’s Peter Jackson (whom he plays on the next day). Baboor and Raman are in group B in the men’s doubles along with the combines of Danny Heinster-Trinko Keen of the Netherlands and Mosiru Kazeem-Segun Toriola of Nigeria. The Indians are scheduled to play both their group ties tomorrow. Poulomi will fight it out with Veronika Pavlovich of Bulgaria on September 17 and French woman Anne Boileau the following day for the right to figure in the main draw. In women’s weightlifting former world champion Malleswari’s credentials are impressive. But she would be competing in the higher weight category of 69 kg — rather than her pet 63 kg — for the first time in her career. She will need to draw from all her vast experience to make a fight of it. Twenty-two-year old Chanu may be not as well known as her senior team-mate, but two experts have predicted here in newspapers and journals that she can end up with a silver or a bronze medal as she is rated the No 2 in the world currently in the 53 kg class. But she has to fight her way in a field which has at least three others who have produced better results than the little Indian ironwoman. T. Muthu, the lone entrant in men’s weightlifting, is not dreaming of a medal, but has said he would strive every sinew to improve upon his personal best of 252 kg (112 in snatch and 140 in clean and jerk) in the 56 kg category. At the shooting range Abhinav Bindra, in men’s 10m air rifle preliminaries, and Anjali Vedpathak, in women’s 10m air rifle preliminaries, will be India’s competitors. The fortunes of the rowers, participating in the Olympics for the first time, will be clearer after the draw is made later today. For the athletes, who are still coming here in batches, the D-Day is a week away. |
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SYDNEY, Sept 15 (PTI) — Indian ace Leander Paes was handed a tough job in both doubles and singles events of the Olympics men’s tennis championships here today. Paes and his partner Mahesh Bhupathi, who ended 1999 as world No 1 pair on the ATP rankings, have been drawn to meet the crack Australian combination of Mark Woodforde and Todd Woodbridge in the second round. While the Woodies, seeded No 1, got the first round bye in the 32-team main draw, the Indian tandem of Paes and Bhupathi will face a first round hurdle in modest Romanian pair of Andrei Pavel and Gabriel Trifu in the top half. The all-conquering Indians, before their acrimoniuos split early this year, have beaten the Aussie pair twice on the circuit. But the Olympics being a swansong for the Woodies and the competition being held at home, the Indians have a formidable task on hand. Should the Indians get past the retiring combination when the event starts here on Tuesday, their path to the medals round looks quite clear. In men’s singles, 1996 Atlanta games bronze medallist Paes, who received an ITF wildcard here, was drawn to meet tenacious Swede Mikael Tillstrom in the first round. India’s flag-bearer at the opening ceremony today seems to have a thorn-ladden path before him if he is to get anywhere near his Atlanta showing. If Paes crosses the first hurdle, sixth-seeded American Michael Chang is his likely opponent in the second round. And further ahead Briton seventh-seeded Tim Henman will be waiting to face the Indian. Newly crowned US Open champion Marat Safin of Russia heads the seedings and opens his campaign against Fabrice Santoro of France. The in-form Safin will be Paes’s opponent further into the event if the Indian causes a few upsets on his way. Brazilian star ‘Guga’ Gustavo Kuerten is seeded second and is in the bottom half of the draw which also features Russian Yevgeny Kafelnikov and Nicolas Kiefer of Germany. Paes and Bhupathi reached every Grand Slam final in 1999 — winning French Open and Wimbledon titles — before parting ways soon after the ATP World Doubles Championships. The duo have since agreed to mend their differences but they are struggling to find their previous form. After coming together, the two reached quarterfinals of ATP Tour event near New York before crashing in the first round of US Open to Argentina’s Daniel Orsanic and Brazil’s Jaime Oncins. The Indian women’s duo of Nirupama Vaidyananthan and Manisha Malhotra, who got into the main draw following German Anke Huber’s withdrawal due to wrist injury, also seem to be in for a hard time. They were drawn to meet sixth-seeded Aussies Jelena Dokic and Rennae Stubbs in the first round. |
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SYDNEY, Sept 15 (Reuters) — Australia is ready to hail Ian Thorpe as one of the biggest winners in Olympic swimming history on the opening day in Sydney’s Homebush Bay pool tomorrow. The 17-year-old prodigy, powered by size 17 feet, has exerted such domination in the 400 metres freestyle this year that he could win the event by the largest margin in nearly a century. Nobody has won the 400 freestyle by more than 3.1 seconds since English cotton mill worker Henry Taylor prevailed in the 440 yards equivalent over Australian Frank Beaurepaire by 7.4 seconds at the London Olympics of 1908. Thorpe posted a world record three minutes 41.33 seconds in the Sydney Olympic pool in the Australian selection trials in May and the nearest anyone has got to that time this year is the 3:47.18 swum by Klete Keller in the US trials in August. Thorpe’s illustrious compatriot Murray Rose, the only man to have won the event twice, produced matching winning margins of 3.1 seconds to clinch gold in Melbourne in 1956 and Rome in 1960, with Japan’s Tsuyoshi Yamanaka claiming the silver each time. Nobody looks remotely capable of denying Thorpe his place as Olympic champion in an event whose past winners include Johnny “Tarzan’’ Weissmuller and Buster Crabbe, who both found fame in Hollywood. Thorpe is overwhelming favourite for three golds in the eight-day swimming programme — 200, 400 and 4x200 freestyle relay — and will be up for another medal on the opening day in the 4x100 metres freestyle relay, in which the USA are front-runners. Thorpe himself wisely refuses to regard himself as certain to win the 400m. “I just hope that I’m going to be able to handle the conditions and get the best performance out of myself,’’ he said earlier this week. But his rivals are already scattering. World champion Michael Klim pulled out of the 200m to concentrate on better gold medal chances elsewhere. Grant Hackett, who took fellow Australian Klim’s place in the 200m, says he will use the 400m as a warm-up for his main event, the 1,500m. Hackett, overtaken by Thorpe’s fierce finishing kick in the 1998 world championship 400 freestyle final in Perth, came in nearly 10 seconds adrift in the 400 at the Olympic trials. Japan’s Yasuko Tajima and Ukraine’s European champion Yana Klochkova are leading contenders for the women’s 400 metres individual medley crown, the evening’s only other individual event final. The USA should collect the two other titles in the session — the men’s and women’s 4x100 metres freestyle relays. World record holders Inge de Bruijn of the Netherlands and Roman Sludnov of Russia will also be in action on the first day in events — 200 metres and less — which go to semifinals, with finals the following day. De Bruijn, who has set seven world records and equalled one this summer, goes into the women’s 100 metres butterfly about a second quicker this year than her nearest rivals, the vastly experienced Americans Dara Torres and Jenny Thompson, the world champion. Sludnov set a world record of 1:00.36 for the men’s 100 metres breaststroke in June and the one-minute barrier could well be breached. American Ed Moses, Sludnov’s main rival, has threatened to swim it in 59 seconds to upstage Thorpe. “Going under the minute would be a good way to start the fire,’’ Moses said at the US pre-Olympic training camp in Brisbane last weekend. “There’s going to be a big surprise. Australia has the 400 metres freestyle with Ian Thorpe and I can nullify that swim. Australians, roaring Thorpe on in the 17,500-capacity indoor pool centre and millions more watching on television cannot be expected to believe a word of it. |
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Sydney countdown — 74 One of the unexpected pleasures available to us in the host country in these first few hours of the Olympic Games is to eavesdrop on all the flattering things people are writing or saying about Australia in the overseas media. There has been the occasional questioning of Sydney’s readiness for the event and a bit of joshing about bus drivers losing their way or fireworks setting off grass fires, but generally the world seems to be looking on Australia, and Sydney in particular, through indulgent eyes. As James Mossop told British readers of the Daily Telegraph : “Never in its history has this young and vibrant place presented itself for the searching examinations that are about to begin. Will Sydney 2000 pass the test? Optimism rules and the early signs suggest that they will get it right and the world will go home with a hangover enriched by fond memory.” But Australia should not be fooled by all the bouquets. When some things go wrong, as is inevitable with an event of this scale, the people who are now singing Australia’s praises will be merciless in their criticism. Nothing fascinates the media as much as a debacle. As a resident of Australia I have an Olympics wish list. At the top of my Olympics wish list — and I’m sure that of most other Australians — is that Sydney will be spared a major calamity of either man-made or natural causes. People who will be watching it all on television will dearly hope that the excellent Qantas advertisement showing Australian children in different parts of the world (and much of it in India, the Taj Mahal and the Rajasthan desert) is not played too often. Next is the hope, futile I suspect, that the people who describe the opening and closing and medal, ceremonies will pronounce the word “cereminny” instead of the Americanised “ceremoany”. The same goes for “duhfence” and “deefence” during the basketball, football and hockey commentaries. And can we hope that some swimming commentators will learn to refer to the farthest, or even furthest lane, rather than the “furtherest” one. And lastly, I do wish the world’s athletes teach some of the brash American sports stars that they have a battle on their hands. Americans however were not paying a lot of attention to the Sydney Olympics preoccupying the rest of the world but that changed as the games hit their TV guides this week. One Australian journalist just back from New York said, “Utter almost anything in an Aussie accent in New York city in September of the year 2000 and there’s a flash of celebratory recognition”. But in case the SOCOG and the Australian Tourism Commission are breaking out champagne over this success of their public relations endeavours, they should hold on to the fizz. Only now, with the Olympics underway, has some kind of consciousness of the other looming extravaganza descended on bits of New York. This week well into the pre-Olympic home stretch, the New York Times finally published its guide to the games, complete with feature pieces on Ian Thorpe and Cathy Freeman. Among other vital statistics such as the size of Thorpe’s feet, it revealed news of Freeman’s equally famous tattoo. Perhaps it was a glitch in the transmission of the piece from Sydney or maybe The Times just figured that Australians are a weird mob. But there was no explanation for the mangled description of the tattoo as reading “Acosda I’m free”. It’s a pity because what the tattoo actually says is something perfectly understandably Australian: “Cos I’m free”. But then, these are Aussie games and the Americans haven’t quite got hold of them yet. Maybe the Americans haven’t heard the latest news that Freeman is likely to relocate to the USA after the Sydney games. Members of the most famous and successful track club in the world — the US-based Hudson Smith International — have taken notice of Cathy Freeman. Ato Boldon, the sprinter from Trinidad and Tobago who is most likely to give Maurice Greene a run for his money, already feels Freeman is part of his extended family. “It’s funny, we feel like she’s in already,” Boldon, a long-time member of HSI, said of rumours Freeman would join the club. US sports fans are apparently more concerned about what they will not be seeing, or at least when they will not be seeing it. US network NBC, which has Olympic broadcast rights in the USA, is screening everything in delay so it goes to air in prime time. It has opted for delayed telecasts to maximise its audience rather than screen all that gold, gold, gold live for what might be only a few diehards — at 3 am. You see when the cold war ended, Americans found that winning had lost some of its lustre. Beating the Soviet Union was a pleasure. Beating poor, bankrupt Russia is like winning an exhibition game. Crushing East Germany was good for the digestion. But beating Germany now is about as satisfying as beating Ecuador. So you must take your hat off to the Aussies for putting the grudge back into the Olympic match. So far, Australia’s various teams have given the Americans a racial insult, a trash-talking war in the Olympic pool, and a near-fight on the basketball court, and every bit of it directed against the USA. Ok, they could do better. Someone could say something about Maurice Greene’s mama, and it would be helpful if an Australian politician would call America the ‘Evil Empire’ or, if that’s too strong, the Naughty Nation, but it’s a start. At least it gives a fan someone to cheer against as well as for. The USA has kept up its end of the bargain, with Dream Teamer Vince Carter getting caught up in a shoving and shouting match with Australian guard Shane Heal (a former NBA player), and swimmer Gary Hall saying that America’s swimmers would crush the Aussies “like guitars.” None of this would work if Australia were just another second-rate, wanna-be athletic power. Sporting hate doesn’t work unless it has a worthy object. Fortunately, Australia, with a population of a mere 19 million, is the world’s emerging athletic power. Sports Illustrated sees more than 60 medals in Australia’s immediate Olympic future. And a lot of those are going to be contested against the Americans in the pool, on the track, and on the basketball court. The Aussies have developed a brashness to go along with their
talent. But who cares? This isn’t about being reasonable. It’s about elevating the blood pressure and having a reason to care. American swimmer Neil Walker got it exactly right when he said the controversy has made swimming a lot more fun. “It’s just really exciting,” he said. “It’s kind of like the college atmosphere in the US when there’s a lot of teams really close talent-wise and we get to battle once in awhile. It just brings the best competitors out of everybody.” The cold war is over, let the battles begin!
— PMG |
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Baboor drawn to meet easy rivals SYDNEY, Sept 15 (PTI) — Former national champion Chetan Baboor was yesterday drawn to meet unfancied rivals in men’s singles and doubles at the Olympic Games table tennis championships. The ace paddler, who is into his second Olympics after an early exit in Atlanta four years ago, will have to stave off the challenge from Petr Korbel of the Czech Republic and New Zealand’s Peter Jackson in the preliminary group C to make it to the main draw. The India number one is partnering national champion S. Raman in the men’s doubles where the duo will be up against the Dutch pair of Danny Heister-Trinko Keen and the Nigerian combination of Segun Toriola-Kazeem in its quest to get into the 16-team main draw. Commonwealth Games bronze medallist Baboor, ranked 82nd in the world, won a match and lost two in the preliminary round in Atlanta, hopes to make best of the draw as Korbel and Jackson do not seem to be much of a threat to his aspirations. Should Baboor get into the main draw, he will be up against a formidable opponent, former world champion Jean-Phileppe Gatien of France, in the second round starting on September 21. Going by the current form of Commonwealth championship gold medallists Raman and Baboor, they should make it to the doubles main draw from group B. But the Indians’ path from that stage seems riddled with big hurdles. They are drawn to run into a top Korean pair which is ranked in the world’s top 10, Kim Taek-Soo and Oh Sang-Eun, in the first round on Wednesday. The lone Indian woman Poulomi Ghatak is logged in group L of the singles preliminary round. Poulomi is bracketed with Frenchwoman Anne Boileau and Veronika Pavlovich of Belarus with the competition starting on Sunday. |
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Oldest Olympian,
war veteran at ceremony SYDNEY, Sept 15 (AFP) — Australia’s two special guests at tonight’s Sydney 2000 opening ceremony were the nation’s oldest living female Olympian, Edith Payne (nee Robinson) and Charles Mance, the country’s oldest living war veteran. Robinson, now aged 95, was the first woman to compete for Australia in the athletics event at the Olympics, when she ran in the 100m and the 800m at the 1928 Amsterdam Games, which was the first time women’s athletics events were held. She was eliminated in the semifinals. She also ran in the infamous 800m event which led to distance events being regarded as unsuitable for women. She is now confined to a wheelchair after having her leg amputated a few years ago. Mance, who turns 100 on December 3, was just 16 years when he lied about his age and enlisted in World War I in 1917 when reinforcements were urgently needed on the western front. |
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Cathy Freeman
lights Olympic flame SYDNEY, Sept 15 (PTI) — Australia’s double world 400m women’s champion Cathy Freeman waded through water to light the Olympic flame with an artificial waterfall forming the background and launched the first Games of the new millennium in spectacular style at Stadium Australia here this evening. Freeman, of Aboriginal descent, got the torch from Debbie Flintoff-King after a short relay of past Australian women Olympians with it inside the stadium before climbing up the steps leading to the cauldron. She lowered the torch inside an artificial pool of water at the end of the steps and lit a ring of fire around herself. Even as the spectators inside the packed stadium, and millions of others watching the telecast around the world, were wondering how she was going to come out of it, the circle of fire magically lifted above her to form the cauldron. The cauldron was then lifted by hydraulic lifts to the roof. |
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SYDNEY, Sept 15 (AFP) — Gold medal contenders Pakistan are beset with injuries ahead of their opening match against Canada in the Olympic field hockey competition on Sunday. A month-long sojourn in Australia before the games has taken it’s toll as four key players struggle to regain peak fitness for the opener. Key midfielder Irfan Yousuf’s thigh injury is the most serious, making him doubtful for Sunday’s match, manager Islahuddin Siddiqui said today. “We are working hard on him, but it’s a race against time to have him fully fit,” Islahuddin told afp. “Irfan is a key member of the team. It will be a big blow if he does not play.” Irfan’s place in the side could go to veteran Malik Shafqat, one of the three past Olympians in the squad who was expected to be in the reserves. Shafqat (30), recalled to the national squad last year after three years in the wilderness, has played only in short burst during Pakistan’s warm-up matches. Adding to Islahuddin’s problems are niggling injuries to striker Kashif Javed, winger Sameer Hussain and defender Tariq Imran. Short of fit players, the 49-year-old Islahuddin was forced to take the field to make up the numbers during training sessions over the last two days. “It’s nice to play with the boys, but I would have preferred to supervise them from outside,” he said. “God willing, we will have a full team on Sunday because the injuries are not very serious.” Pakistan, who won the last of their three Olympic gold at Los Angeles in 1984, cannot afford to drop a point to Canada if they are to qualify for the semifinals from the tough group B. Their other opponents in what is regarded as the ‘group of death’ are defending champions the Netherlands, strong contenders Germany, Britain and Malaysia. Even Canada, the Pan-American champions, will fancy their chances for the two semifinal berths from the group after a successful European tour in July when they twice defeated Atlanta silver-medallists Spain. |
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SYDNEY, Sept 15 (AFP) — Athletes from North and South Korea struck a sporting blow for the cause of reunification today, marching together for the first time at an Olympic opening ceremony. Wearing identical uniforms, about 180 athletes from the Cold War foes strode into Sydney’s Stadium Australia behind a white flag adorned with a light-blue Korean peninsula to the tune of folk song “Arirang”. A packed Stadium Australia crowd gave the Koreans a standing ovation. The move, brought about as a result of negotiations between the two countries and the International Olympic Committee, marked the first time since they went to war in 1950 that the two countries had marched under a common flag at the Olympics. The Koreas are still technically at war, having never signed a peace accord. But ever since a June summit between the South’s President Kim Dae-Jung and the North’s supreme leader Kim Jong-Il, the two Koreas have been progressing slowly towards peace and reunification. Officials in Seoul today said Kim Jong-II was likely to visit the South Korean capital next year while defence ministers from the two sides were likely to meet this month. The IOC asked the two Koreas to march together in Sydney just before the breakthrough summit in Pyongyang. But it was not until this week that a breakthrough occurred and their new uniforms, which include a blue blazer with a chest patch featuring a unified korea, were rushed to Sydney from Seoul. |
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Shooters to win
first medals SYDNEY, Sept 15 (Reuters) — The first medals of the Sydney Olympics will not, as has been widely reported, be decided in the women’s triathlon on Saturday morning but instead will be handed out in the women’s 10 metres air rifle shooting. While the world’s attention is focused on the triathlon in and around Sydney’s spectacular harbour, the shooters will be going about their business in the calmer surroundings of Cecil Park, some 50 km inland. The triathlon was selected as the curtain-raiser in 1997 because of the marvellous views of the harbour it will provide on television — and because Australia are heavily favoured to win the gold medal. It begins at 4.30 am IST and the winners will cross the line in front of the Opera House just under two hours later. |
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SYDNEY Sept 15 (AFP) — The International Olympic Committee (IOC) heaped praise on the Sydney opening ceremony today, with Mr Juan Antonio Samaranch describing it as the most beautiful of his presidency. “The opening ceremony was an excellent beginning for the Sydney Games,” Mr Samaranch said. “It was the most beautiful Olympic ceremony of my presidency.” The IOC President, presiding over his last Games, also said he was deeply touched by the crowd’s reception for athletes from North and South Korea, who marched together for the first time. Australian Prime Minister John Howard said most people would have been moved by the spectacle of the ceremony. “It was a very impressive and moving opening ceremony and I think most Australians would have been quite emotional about it,” he said after Aboriginal athlete Cathy Freeman lit the cauldron to signal the start of the Games. |
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Athletes take anti-drug pledge SYDNEY, Sept 15 (AP) — For the first time at an Olympic opening ceremony, the athletes’ oath included a pledge against the use of drugs at the Games. Rechelle Hawkes, captain of the Australian women’s field hockey team, read the oath on behalf of nearly 11,000 athletes entered in the Sydney Games. “In the name of all the competitors, I promise that we shall take part in these Olympic Games, respecting and abiding by the rules which govern them, commiting ourselves to a sport without doping and without drugs, in the spirit of true sportsmanship, for the glory of sport and the honour of our teams.” The no-doping clause was added to the traditional athletes’ oath as part of the reforms adopted by the International Olympic Committee in December 1999. |
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BULAWAYO, Sept 15 (Reuters) — New Zealand took three early wickets in Zimbabwe’s second innings to breathe new life into the first Test today. At tea on the fourth day, Zimbabwe were 36 for three, a lead of 48 runs. New Zealand were dismissed for 338 in reply to Zimbabwe’s first innings of 350. Zimbabwe’s problems began in the seventh over of their second innings when Gavin Rennie was bowled for two by seamer Chris Cairns. Stuart Carlisle advanced down the pitch to off-spinner Paul Wiseman and was bowled for 15, followed two balls later by Grant Flower, on three, edging a delivery from left-arm paceman Shayne O’Connor to wicketkeeper Adam Parore to reduce Zimbabwe to 23-3. At the crease at tea were Alistair Campbell, who has yet to score, and Andy Flower, on 13 not out. New Zealand were dismissed in the seventh over after lunch when leg-spinner Paul Strang caught and bowled O’Connor for four. Scoreboard Zimbabwe (First innings): 350 (A. Campbell 88, H. Streak 51 P. Wiseman 5-90) New Zealand (First innings):
overnight 252-7. Richardson c Carlisle b Streak 6 Horne lbw b P. Strang 110 Sinclair lbw b P. Strang 12 Wiseman lbw b P. Strang 14 Fleming c Rennie b P. Strang 11 Astle c A. Flower b P. Strang 0 McMillan c A. Flower b P. Strang 58 Cairns b Streak 33 Parore not out 32 Vettori c and b P. Strang 49 O’connor c Campbell b P. Strang 4 Extras
(lb-1 nb-8): 9 Total (all out, 153.5 overs): 338 Fall of wickets:
1-15 2-52 3-109 4-139 5-139 6-180 7-252 8-252 9-330. Bowling:
Streak 26-9-67-2 (nb-1), Nkala 21-6-43-0 (nb-2), P. Strang 51.5-12-109-8, B. Strang 25-7-63-0 (nb-5), Mutendera 14-4-29-0, G. Flower 16-4-26-0. |
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Jeev set to make comeback CHANDIGARH, Sept 15 — After almost six months of absence from the circuit, ace golfer Jeev Milkha Singh will make his comeback to professional golf during the Xerox Open Golf Championship, which begins at the Classic Golf Resort, Delhi, on September 19. Jeev, who received the Arjuna Award for excellence in sports this year, hurt his wrists while playing the Johnnie Walker Classic on European PGA Tour in November, 1999. He had to pull out of the Tour in March this year with the injury aggravating. At the time of pulling out, Jeev was the only Indian to have qualified for the top-grade European Tour being placed 26th in the Order of Merit, Jeev underwent extensive physiotherapy treatment in the USA and is now all set to return to action. “I am raring to go. All these months of frustrations and watching golf on television had made me very hungry. The Xerox Open Golf Championship forms a very important part of my comeback plan and I am extremely thankful to the sponsors Xerox Medicorp Limited for giving me an opportunity to play”, said the 29-year old who has been given a sponsor’s exemption to play the tournament. The Xerox Open Golf Championship marks Xerox Modicorp’s first foray into professional golf, or for the matter in any major sporting event in the country. Xerox is the official sponsor of the Olympic Games, the mega quadrennial event. The tournament, to be played on a 72-hole strokeplay format, offers a total prize money of Rs 6 lakh. The winner’s cheque will be worth Rs 97,2000 while the runner-up will be richer by Rs 67,200. |
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One of the unexpected pleasures available to us in the host country in these first few hours of the Olympic Games is to eavesdrop on all the flattering things people are writing or saying about Australia in the overseas media. There has been the occasional questioning of Sydney’s readiness for the event and a bit of joshing about bus drivers losing their way or fireworks setting off grass fires, but generally the world seems to be looking on Australia, and Sydney in particular, through indulgent eyes.
