South Africa: Ask Hard Questions of Athletics Now, Or Osaka Disaster Will Be Repeated at Beijing 2008
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Cape Argus (Cape Town)
3 September 2007
Posted to the web 3 September 2007
Cape Town
South Africa has sent some ordinary teams on assignment since returning to international competition in 1992. However, the 23 member track and field squad that travelled to Osaka, Japan, for the World Championships ranks among the poorest.
For the fourth time in eight world championships Stuttgart 1993, Gothenburg 1995, Helsinki 2005 and now Osaka South Africa failed to deliver a medal.
In the early days the extenuating circumstances were legitimate; the country had just returned to the international fold and the learning curve was steep.
However, the alarm bells should have rung in Helsinki two years ago when the team came back without a medal. They didn’t ring. But even that performance pales into insignificance when matched against the 2007 “vintage”.
Of the 23 squad members, the highest-placed finish was fifth (Godfrey Mokoena in the long jump). Only two athletes Robert Oosthuizen (javelin) and Janice Josephs (women’s long jump) achieved new personal bests, so they escape criticism.
The other 21, Olympic 800m silver medallist Mbulaeni Mulaudzi and 400m hurdler LJ van Zyl included, should hang their heads.
Neither has an excuse, Van Zyl showing amateurish execution when slowing near the finish of his heat, while Mulaudzi failed miserably in yesterday’s two-lapper, unable to read the slow pace of the race and fading to seventh in the inevitable sprint finish.
The worrying fact is that the two IAAF world championships between Olympics have failed to yield a medal. We are fortunate that there’s a Rugby World Cup and a Twenty20 world championship to cause a distraction, for the reality is that South African athletics has never been at a lower ebb.
Athletics, along with swimming, are the two big codes of any Olympic Games, and the swimmers are consistently hammering out better results when it counts.
All one asks for at this level, is that the athletes put in their best efforts. Our swimmers do that consistently, returning a string of PBs.
By comparison, the track and field “stars” leave their bests behind when it counts. Perhaps they achieve them in the bedrooms, the food halls, the dance floors, but certainly not on the track.
Oh, to have someone like Oscar Pistorius being able to show them what true dedication and hunger is about, and what it really means to represent your country.
But if the athletes themselves are shamed, the coaches and administrators must assume responsibility. Track and field here is dying, and being the leading sport in an Olympics and with less than a year to go to Beijing strong measures should be taken to ensure we don’t embarrass ourselves next year.
Athletics is one sport that can’t claim not to be transformed either. Of the 23 member squad, there were 14 black athletes, or 61%, while the administration reflects the demographics of the country. Nor can there be arguments over selection.
Next year, the Olympic chiefs will stand up and say something like, “We’ve set a target of 10 medals” (anything less would be admitting our sport hasn’t gone forward in 10 years).
But who takes responsibility and accountability if they don’t? Just like this track and field squad who had been set a target of five medals, but return empty handed.
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This non-performance was like the Springboks losing to Romania, the Proteas being beaten by Bahamas or Bafana Bafana going down to American Samoa.
If Butana Komphela and his parliamentary sports committee were truly interested in sport they’d come out right now and ask questions of South African athletics, rather than sprouting nonsense about quotas in rugby and cricket when it suits them.
Gentlemen, show your true sporting colours now, or forever hold your peace.