Rafa Maciel

To be clear, I think the women did pretty well 3 getting to the final round - that's an improvement on last year - and Klugman is going to spearhead the next generation of British players. My comment was more geared towards the men's side of things. Only 2 players got through their first round compared to 4 last year.

Men's Singles: Arthur Fery (#243) v Daniel Altmaier (#77) Fery has a string of first round defeats this season so unlikely that he'll be able to get past Altmaier but worth pointing out that Altmaier hasn't competed on grass so far this season. Charles Broom (#245) v Stan Wawrinka (#93) Expect this to be on one of the show courts. Broom reached the final of the Challenger in Nottingham before coming close to qualifying for the main draw in Eastbourne (he ultimately got promoted as a lucky loser). Unfortunately, he is likely to come up short against Wawrinka. Liam Broady (#146) v Botic van de Zandschulp (#96). Broady lost in the first round at Eastbourne whilst van de Zandschulp was out in the first round at S'Hertogenbosch. Broady will go into the match believing he has a decent chance of winning. Jan Choinski (#174) v Luciano Darderi (#37). Darderi recently won a challenger event in Perugia so his confidence is riding high whilst Choinski's form hasn't been great recently. Dan Evans (#61) v 24th seed Alejandro Tabilo (#24). Evans picked up an injury at Queens and had to withdraw from his first round match. He isn't in the best form whereas Tabilo is in the final of the Mallorca Championships. Jack Draper (#28) v Elias Ymer (#206). Jack Draper is the only Brit to be seeded this year after taking his first title in Stuttgart. He followed that up with quarter-final at Queens. He should be able to dispatch Ymer fairly easily and there's a possibility of all British second round. Cameron Norrie (#44) v Facundo Diaz Acosta (#67). Norrie seems to be in a bit of a spiral and his ranking is only heading in the wrong direction. His form is pretty dire of late - highlighted by a defeat at the hands of Jack Pinnington Jones at the challenger in Nottingham. That was followed by first round losses at both Queens and Eastbourne. Grass isn't the natural surface for Diaz Acosta but he will probably start as favourite. Henry Searle (#568) v Marcos Giron (#46). Giron has reached the second round at Eastbourne and Stuttgart and the quarter-final at Halle. That being said, Searle won the boy's championships last year and so far, this grass court season he has come through qualifying at Eastbourne and the Nottingham challengers and reached the final of ITF event in Nottingham. Giron will start as firm favourite. Andy Murray (#115) v Tomas Machac (#38). Think there is a good chance Murray will withdraw before the tournament gets under way given the recent procedure on his back. It's a shame if this really was going to be his Wimbledon swansong. Billy Harris (#139) v Jaume Munar (#63). Billy Harris is the BBC's new darling of tennis given his back story. (FWIW I think it's great he is getting some great results, but I am getting tired of hearing about his transit van). His confidence will be sky high after reaching the semi-final at Eastbourne and I think he could have a great chance of taking Munar out. Munar's only grass court match this year ended in defeat at Mallorca Championship. Paul Jubb (#289) v Thiago Seyboth Wild (#74). Jubb hasn't had a great grass court season losing early at both Queens and the Nottingham challenger. His best performance came in Surbiton where he qualified and made the second round. Seyboth Wild got to the second round at Eastbourne. Jacob Fearnley (#271) v Alejandro Moro Canas (#189). Fearnley won challenger at Nottingham before losing out in the first round at Eastbourne. Moro Canas on the other hand failed to qualify in Ilkley.

Main Draw Participants: Ladies Singles: Francesca Jones (#217) v Petra Martic (#74). Martic got to 3rd round last year but hasn't had great season in the Grand Slams this year. She qualified for main draw at Eastbourne before losing to Katie Boulter in the round of 32. Fran Jones got to the Quarter-final of Nottingham Open before withdrawing as precaution. In that run, Jones took out 8th seed Caroline Dolehide. Martic will start as favourite, but I think Jones has a good chance of pulling of an upset. The winner will be guaranteed centre court billing in round 2 as they will likely be up against Iga Swiatek (at which point their championship will come to an end ). Katie Boulter (#32) v Tatjana Maria (#61). Boulter has played a lot of grass court tennis this season with the sole aim of doing enough to be seeded here at Wimbledon and she got her wish as she is seeded 32. She got to the 3rd round last year and there is every reason to think that she will be able to match that this year. Having retained her title in Nottingham and reaching the quarter-finals at Eastbourne, she will start this match as heavy favourite and could set up and British second round. A potential 3rd round against 5th seed Jessica Pegula will be where the draw starts to get difficult. Harriet Dart (#105) v Bai Zhuoxuan (#92). Like Boulter, Dart has been playing a lot of tennis in the grass court season to the point that she is carrying a knee niggle picked up at Eastbourne. The draw has been relatively kind to her and she should start the match as favourite. Emma Raducanu (#168) v 22nd seed Ekaterina Alexandrova (#22). Alexandrova got to the 4th round here in 2023 but hasn't made it out of the 1st round at the last 2 slams. Alexandrova reached the semi-final at S'Hertogenbosch before losing in the 2nd round at both Berlin and Bad Homburg Open. Raducanu skipped the French Open to concentrate on preparing for the grass court season and it seems to have paid off. She reached the semi-final in Nottingham. She was well placed to take the win against Boulter and was unlucky that it was called off after the first set. At Eastbourne, she got her first win over a top ten player when she took out Jessica Pegula in the second round. Alexandrova probably starts as the favourite but Raducan could pull a surprise. Yuriko Lily Miyazaki (#148) v Tamara Korpatsch (#75). Korpatsch will start as favourite despite having a mixed grass court season to date. She lost in the first round at S'Hertogenbosch and Berlin but reached the 2nd round at Bad Homburg. Heather Watson (#196) v Greet Minnen (#85). Having played doubles together at Birmingham, they should know each other's game pretty well. Minnen reached the quarter-final at S'Hertogenbosch at came through qualifying at Eastbourne last week before losing in the first round to Jelena Ostapenko. Heather Watson on the other hand reached second round at Nottingham before losing in the first round at Birmingham Classic. This one could go either way but Watson will be hoping home support can help pull her through. Sonay Kartal (#295) v 29th seed Sorana Cirstea (#29) Kartal's reward for coming through qualifying is a 1st round match up against the 29th seed. Cirstea reached the 3rd round last year and will start as favourite but she isn't in great form having lost in the first round at both Birmingham Classic and Eastbourne. Kartal on the other hand has plenty of grass court tennis under her belt over the last couple of weeks so I wouldn't be too surprised if she pulls off a shock.

The biggest tennis jamboree gets underway on Monday and whilst I wont have the luxury of watching the majority of it, I'll be keeping a close eye on as many of the matches as I can. Quick rundown of the Brits taking part: Men's Qualifying: Felix Gill (#306) - Wildcard entry was beaten in the first round by 30th seed Emilio Nava (#136) Ryan Peniston (#266) - Beaten in the first round by Benjamin Bonzi (#152) George Loffhagen (#754) - Wildcard entry got through a tough 3 set first round match but fell in the second round to 5th seed Lloyd Harris (#91) Jack Pinnington Jones (#639) - Wildcard entry soundly beaten in the first round by Lucas Pouille (#213) Jay Clarke (#322) - Wildcard took out Diego Schwartzman in the first round but was on the wrong end of a tight 3 setter in round 2, going out at the hands of Quentin Halys (#223) Stuart Parker (#561) - Wildcard entry lost in the first round to Patrick Kypson (#142) Anton Matusevich (#434) - Wildcard entry beaten in the first round by Tomas Barrios Vera (#196) Oliver Crawford (#217) - Former American, he was a little unlucky with the draw coming up against 20th seed veteran Richard Gasquet (#126) in the first round, losing in 2 sets. Ladies Qualifying: Mika Stojsavljevic (#654) - Wildcard entry was beaten in the first round by Selena Janicijevic (#223) Sonay Kartal (#295) - Wildcard entry has made it to the main draw. This will be her 3rd time at Winmbledon, but she is yet to win a main draw match. Emily Appleton (#353) - Wildcard entry lost in the first round to Elsa Jacquemot (#151) Amelia Rajecki (#740) - Wildcard entry unsurprisingly beaten in the first round by 7th seed Arina Rodionova (#101) Mingge Xu (#692) - Wildcard entry lost in the first round to Ipek Oz (#260) Katy Dunne (#331) - Wildcard entry beaten in the first round in tight 3 sets by Tena Lukas (#224) Hannah Klugman (#623) - There were high hopes for last year's Orange Bowl winner and to an extent, she didn't disappoint, making it to the final round of qualifying before coming unstuck against Alycia Parks (#121) Amarni Banks (#258) - Wildcard entry did well to make it to the final round of qualifying, but ran out of steam against Marina Stakusic (#164) Overall, a pretty disappointing qualifying campaign by the Brits with just a couple of exceptions.

Not sure on this. The athlete eligibility only says that the rider has to have gained at least 10 points in a qualifying event counting towards the Olympic Ranking - it doesn't specify the requirement applies to each event they are entered for. I'm sure a good lawyer could make an effective argument

Not surprised by the lack of Thomas or Cavendish in the road squad but perhaps a little surprised that neither of the Yates brothers got the nod. I am surprised that Ed Lowe got selected ahead of both Truman and Fielding for team sprint. He competed in 2 NC events this year but hasn't exactly been a mainstay of the squad so far. Biggest shock probably selection of Maclean-Howell ahead of both Annie Last and Isla Short in women's MTB. I get the logic behind it - young athlete with potential for LA'28 - but it's tough on the more established elite riders.

I was pretty skeptical of the concept of the OQS when it was first announced - I thought it would be a bit of a gimmick but I think I could be converted to it. The sports they have selected to showcase at the OQS have all worked pretty well. Not breaking obviously because it has no place anywhere near an Olympic games - but the rest were great to watch. I wonder if they'll look to extend the OQS in 2028 - I'd like to see beach volleyball getting involved next time.

I'd been thinking about the same thing - how best to share GB performances for those of us not lucky enough to be able to go in person. My initial thought was to create a thread for each day with the first post highlighting the Team GB athletes who will be competing and potential medals. Most of that can be completed in advance of the opening day so will give the group a focus for discussion whilst we wait for the action to get underway.

1.) I think the women's football team will be biggest disappointment but worth bearing in mind that their performances - continental champions and world cup runners up - would have been enough to qualify in any other continent and would have qualified them across the last 3 Olympic cycles. Just our luck the UEFA moved the goalposts - no pun intended - for Paris. Second qualification miss would be women's basketball team - they threw away a great chance to get to the OQT. Last up would be men's BMX Racing - across the majority of the qualification window, GB were on track for 2 spots but they couldn't string the results together in the final run up so we end up with just a single spot. 2.) It has always surprised me that squash hasn't had their chance at Olympic exposure but I'm not a huge fan of the idea that we have to keep adding more and more sports to the Olympics - history suggests that adding more events only dilutes the quality of the fields existing sports. 3.) Not changes for Paris but for future I'd like to see taekwondo get rid of their limitation to team sizes - if you're good enough to earn a quota through a qualifying tournament you should be able to go the games. I'd also like to see the continental quotas reformed - the notion that we need to have every continent represented in every event is for the birds. All it does is give free quotas to big countries and does nothing to develop the sport in the smaller countries on the continent. Last up I'd say if the event has less than 30 competitors in it, then each NOC should be limited to 2 spots.

BOA confirming we've qualified full team for sport climbing and 3 for skateboarding - Brown, Tambling and MacDonald

Is MacDonald the one that looks like a maths teacher clinging on to his youth and wants to be "down with the cool kids"?

After relatively disappointing European Champs, Molly Caudery is back on form with a new NR of 4.92. Her confidence is riding high as she then went on to try clearing 5.00m

4.92m NR and WL for Molly Caudery

Charlotte Worthington having another pretty mediocre competition - 10th place in the final. At least she managed a respectable score this time out though.

Wont be confirmed until after tomorrow's final, but looks like McArthur has done enough to stay in top-10 and take Paris quota. Although he doesn't make it to the final, there's only a handful of lower ranked climbers who could overtake him and they would need a monster performance in the final for them to get enough points to do it.

Yes - first version in August '22, then revised in January '23 and then again in Febuary this year.

Not sure - the previous version I had downloaded was from Jan-23. The current qualification document is dated Feb-24 but I'm not sure if there were any versions published between those dates.

Looks like Thompson-Smith will miss out on a direct quota - she needed to overtake Kim and Krampl to get into the top 10 (excluding duplicates). She should overtake Kim but will finish behind Krampl. I think she's on track to finish in 11th place in the rankings so could be in line for the host quota reallocation.

feck!

Only potential fly in the ointment is the fact that Jones was tied with Logan Martin - but he has been classified ahead of him in the final ranking document so assume that if we are right in the interpretation of the qualifying document Jones should get the reallocation.

I'm not so sure on that. Yes he finished in 7th place in the final OQS rankings so in theory he misses out but..... Jeanjean qualified through OQS and that frees up the Host Quota. Because Jeanjean obtained his quota via OQS, the host quota is reallocated to the next best rider at the OQS which would be Jones.

Good start for Jones and Hessey in qualifying. At the half way point, they are sitting on top of the table and should both make it through to the final. Jones pretty much matched his qualifying score from Shanghai with 83.32 whilst Hessey was down a little at 82.01 (compared to 87.29 in Shanghai)

The BMX Freestyle qualification process was always one of the worst structured documents but it's pretty disappointing that they are allowed to change the qualification pathways when the qualifying process has already kicked off.

Didn't they change the wording of the qualifying document earlier this year so that the 2023 World Champ quotas are reallocated to NOCs that haven't already qualified? That would suggest that assuming Worthington qualifies, then Pardoe wouldn't be eligible for quota reallocation?

Have trade one rainy isle for another - just the rain in is warmer