Rafa Maciel

Had me worried there for a minute

Pretty brutal quarter-final for the girls, coming out on the wrong side of a 25-6 shellacking at the hands of . Would be easy for them to be disheartened by the scale of the result, but worth bearing in mind that this was the first time in a decade that they qualified for the Europeans and, in reaching the QFs, they have guaranteed their place in the 2026 competition. Hopefully they can put in a good show in their next couple of matches and secure a spot in Doha.

Whoever wins the tournament this week will secure a quota for Paris - unless they already have one in which case I think it would go to the highest placed non-qualified nation. If that is the case, then the way that the draw has worked out it looks like the quota will go to either or . A fifth place finish here would put GB into the Doha WC draw where 2 further quotas will be available - in fact depending on how the other results go then GB could finish in 6th or 7th and they would still qualify for Doha.

For 'next year' do you mean Doha or do you think they'll need to wait until 2025 in Kallang?

It looks like over the last few weeks, British Rowing have completed the first couple of events for their 2024 team selection. There are no details published on the federation website, so have no idea of times or any real detail on the results, but I have been able to piece together some information from various news organisations: Men's Sweep Squad Last year's M2- Ollie Wynne-Griffith and Tom George didn't take part in the November trials because George was ill. Wynne-Griffith paired up with Morgan Bolding and finished 4th. Jacob Dawson and Sholto Carnegie were the top pairing ahead of Freddie Davidson and Matthew Aldridge. Will Stewart and James Robson finished 3rd. Neither rower had a seat in the 2023 crews so this strong performance will have caught attention of selectors. It was a relatively poor performance from David Ambler and Oli Wilkes. In the December trials, Will Stewart teamed up with Tom George to take the victory. Given the depth of the sweep squad, I don't think the crew make-up will be clear until after the April trials. Men's Sculling Squad The members of last year's M4x were the top 4 finishers at the open trial in November with Tom Barras taking top spot ahead of George Bourne, Callum Dixon and Matt Haywood. 5th place at November trial went to Cedol Dafydd - he's not someone that I am familiar with but seems to have come up through the GB Development Academy. Graeme Thomas looks like he is back from the injury that kept him out of action for the 2023 season. He won the M1x event at the December trial ahead of George Bourne. In all likelihood, I think that barring injuries, the selectors will probably stick with the same M4x crew from last year whilst Graeme Thomas is probably back in the mix for the M1x. The M2x is more difficult to call - partly because GB don't have a huge depth in the sculling team - and the M2x crew last year had a horror show at the worlds (25th) so the selectors may look to the future and pair up the youngster Dafydd with Miles Devereux as they look to qualify for Paris at the final Olympic qualifying regatta. Women's Sculling Squad Lauren Henry took top spot in the W1x. Her crew mates from last year's W4x Lola Anderson and Georgie Brayshaw were 3rd and 5th. Mathilda Hodgkins Byrne - returning to the squad after maternity leave - took second place. Hodgkins Byrne was part of the squad that finished 7th in Tokyo Olympics. Lightweight pair of Emily Craig and Imogen Grant finished in 4th and 6th and look set to remain best prospect for gold medal in Paris. Lola Anderson won the December trial with a "statement victory" - should point out that in the limited reporting of the December trials, everyone had a statement victory and the news stories are simply copy and paste jobs. Women's Sweep Squad There was no specific sweep trial in November - so the sweep squad took part in the sculling trial. Rowan Mckellar and Heidi Long were the top pairing at the December trial. As with the men's sweep squad, the crew make-up wont be established until the seat racing trials in April. I am expecting there to be crew changes this year, as selectors will be keen to avoid the rowers doubling up. As with the men's sculling squad, the W4x is pretty established and, having won the world champs last year, selectors may be reluctant to make too many changes going into Paris. The return of Hodgkins Byrne does at least give the selectors some options around the W1x and W2x going into the final qualifying regatta with Hodgkins Byrne, Kyra Edwards, Saskia Budgett and Lucy Glover fighting for those 3 seats.

women finish the preliminary round with victory over (if only the basketball team had managed the same result back in the summer!) to top their table. Looks like they will be up against tomorrow for a place in the quarter-finals. Israel haven't had a great tournament so the Brits will be optimistic of pulling off the win - unfortunately they'd then be up against either or so the journey is likely to end there, but if they can get into the QF they qualify for the 2026 European Champs and would give them a chance of qualifying for Doha World Champs.

Agree the diving squad is probably heading into 2024 in the strongest position they have ever been, with a good mix of new names and seasoned competitors. Realistically, I think barring injury, the synchro teams are now pretty much set for Paris - although perhaps there's a question mark over whether it will be Matty Lee or Noah WIlliams teaming up with Daley. (I do think perhaps you are a little harsh with the suggestion that Lee and Williams weren't the best pair for 10m synchro given they were silver medalists in 2022 and at the time, everyone assumed that Daley was done with diving and was focusing on his knitting and crocheting empire.) Based on the British Cup results from earlier this month, I think GB will have good medal prospects for the men's 3m synchro and women's 10m platform. Daley and Williams were 1 dive away from having a global medal winning score. I am less confident on the women's 3m synchro but then I said the same going into Fukuoka and they pulled it out of the bag. In the individual events, it looks like Laugher has recovered from his injury but is perhaps still a little rusty but with him, Goodfellow, Houlden and Halsam there's a strong group of divers on the 3m springboard able to hit around 470-480 points. The challenge over the next 6 months or so is to push those scores up towards 500 if they are hoping to medal in Paris. In the men's 10m, we've got multiple candidates the frame for 2 individual spots but again, they are probably at least 20-30 points short of a medal score at the moment. Big unknown as we go into the new year is whether Daley is going to go for both the synchro and the individual events. For the women, we will have 3 women, fighting for the two spots. With Mew Jensen and Harper already going to Paris in the synchro, it will be interesting to see if Grace Reid is able to muscle her way on to the squad in the individual - she won the British Cup this month with a score that would have been good enough for bronze in Fukuoka so she definitely has the talent. Finally, on the women's platform, Spendolini-Sirieix showed a bit of frailty in Fukuoka when she failed to make it through to the final - but until then she had been a model of consistency and had shown she can deliver on the international stage. That being said, in Doha, it will be important for her to make the final and bury the memory of Fukuoka completely. It will come down to either Louis Toulson or Eden Cheng for the second individual place. Cheng did great at the European Games, but I do think domestically that Toulson has the advantage - her score of 340.20 in Edinburgh at the British Cup this month was just 0.05 off the bronze medal score from Fukuoka. So going into Paris, I would think that UK Sport will give GB Diving a target of 3-4 medals with a stretch target of 6.

Also worth mentioning that the GB mixed duet were top 5 in both the technical and free routines having picked up 2 bronze medals at the European Games and Shortman/ Thorpe took the bronze in the duet freestyle at European Games. The team are getting better, but their acrobatic routine is a weak link that needs a lot of work to put them in contention for Olympic quota. That being said, with the strength of the duets, and if the team can show continued improvement, I think we could see artistic swimming getting another uplift in their funding as we move through to LA '28.

It is a quarterfinal exit for Powell as she loses out to top seed Jie Song 2-0 (0-8, 1-8). Some very weird scoring going on in the fight though with the score having to be corrected twice after Song was awarded points for phantom kicks.

Williams comes up well short losing out 2-1(1-0, 3-10, 9-0). She was "winning" the final round until the last 10 seconds when she basically walked into 3 headshots. Bye-bye Olympic dreams for her

Powell safely navigates her way through her first fight winning 2-0 (2-0, 6-4)

The GB selection policy for the Worlds in Doha is prioritising the Men's 10m synchro - that's now pretty sure to be Daley/Williams - and both the Men's and Women's Individual 3m Springboard. Given Goodfellow has already secured a quota, I'd expect both Laugher and Houlden to make the trip for the men's event. Definitely think the Olympic team is pretty much already decided (barring any major injuries) but as you say, with a packed schedule for 2024, there should be enough competition for everyone in the elite squad to have at least 1 international competition.

British Diving Cup Men's Individual 3m Springboard 1.) Daniel Goodfellow - 476.00 2.) Jack Laugher - 474.55 3.) Jordan Houlden - 470.30 Goodfellow's score is about 40 points higher than he achieved in the final at Fukuoka but wouldn't be enough to trouble the podium. Laugher's Inward 3 1/2 somersaults in tuck let him down a bit and overall his numbers were a bit lower than we're used to seeing but he does seem to be back from his injury problems.

British Diving Cup This week Edinburgh has been hosting the Scottish National Diving Championships/British Diving Cup. This is the key selection event for the 2024 World Championships and saw the competitive return of Tom Daley. Men's 10m Synchro Tom Daley & Noah Williams: 422.46. Score is marginally higher than that achieved by Williams/Lee in the final at Fukuoka. The score was depressed a bit by a poor back 3 1/2 somersaults in pike which only scored 55. Looks like this will be the pairing going to Doha in the only synchro event where GB don't have a quota secured. Women's 10m Synchro Andrea Spendolini-Sirieix & Lois Toulson: 317.10. Score is about 7 points higher than they achieved when they took silver in the final at Fukuoka. Men's 3m Synchro Jack Laugher & Anthony Harding: 437.88. Score is up by around 13 points on their score from Fukuoka. This kind of score would certainly put them in the mix for silver/bronze at any international competition. Yona Knight-Wisdom & Yohan Eskrick-Parkinson scored 351.69. Good to see the smaller nations progressing in the sport - this is 10 points more than they managed in Fukuoka and would probably put them in the mix to qualify for the final. Women's 3m Synchro Scarlett Mew Jensen & Yasmin Harper: 284.34. The only synchro team who weren't able to match their score from Fukuoka. This is a drop of about 12 points and would not have been enough for them to medal. We've also had the preliminary round of the men's individual 3m springboard: 1.) Jack Laugher - 469.85 2.) Ross Haslam - 455.30 3.) Jordan Houlden - 411.10 4.) Daniel Goodfellow - 385.40 5.) Leon Baker - 366.50 Jake Passmore scored 361.45, Yona Knight-Wisdom scored 358 - both outscoring their 2023 World Champs performance.

The team was supposed to be selected at the beginning of October and announced at the end of November but not sure that they stuck to their own schedule.

Day 1 draw for Grand Slam Champions Series Final has been released. Neither of the in action - Aaliyah Powell or Lauren Williams - have a great draw in the -67Kg event as they have been drawn against the number 1 and number 2 seeds in the quarterfinals (assuming they make it through their opening fight). Aaliyah Powell is drawn against Ozoda Sobirjonova in the round of 16. They fought in the quarterfinals of the OQT earlier in the week and Powell came through in a tight match so every chance that she could repeat that tomorrow. If successful, Powell would then be against top seed Jie Song. Song is currently ranked 11th in the Olympic qualifier list and Powell is in pretty good form so she'll have every reason to think she could win that fight. If she gets through to the semi-finals, Powell would face either 4th seed Hyo rim Hong or 5th seed Ruth Gbagbi who face each other in the quarterfinals (this will be a repeat of the OQT Quarterfinal which was won by Hong). Hong Lauren Williams will fight Lilliia Khuzina in the round of 16. They fought in the semifinals of the OQT and Khuzina overwhelmed Williams. The hope is that having had a couple of days off, Williams might be a bit fresher when they fight in the morning. If she can prevail, then she would face 2nd seed Cecilia Castro Burgos. The Spaniard lost in the first round of the OQT so not sure what her form is like.

OQT Grand Slam Champions Series Final Qualifiers - Day 2 (X) indicates the athlete's current Olympic Ranking List. Women's 57Kg 1 Yu-jin Kim (29) 2 Chaima Toumi (18) 3 Tian rui Zhan 4 Tatiana Minina 5 Megawati Maheswari(87) 6 Yirao Sang (346) 7 Gahyeon Kim(51) 8 Margarita Blizniakova Women's +67Kg 1 Polina Khan 2 Fatima-Ezzahra Aboufaras(19) 3 Lei Xu (10) 4 Seungju Oh(153) 5 Sujuan Zhang(124) 6 Anna Pekonnkina 7 Wenzhe Mu(80) 8 Zeqi Zhou (13) Men's 58Kg 1 Gashim Magomedov (23) 2 Huichan Yang(45) 3 Abolfazl Zandi (15) 4 Barbod Jabbari Asyabi(334) 5 Luiz Aquino(90) 6 Georgii Gurtsiev 7 Junsong Yu 8 Alireza Hosseinpour (66) Men's 80Kg 1 Jasurbek Jaysunov (16) 2 Maksim Khramtcov 3 Shukhrat Salaev(15) 4 Mirhashem Hosseini(23) 5 Nedzad Husic(12) 6 Abolfazl Abbasi Pouya 7 Amir Mohammad Bakhshi(58) 8 Vladislav Budin -18 Qualifiers - 14 Qualifiers - 9 Qualifiers - 7 Qualifiers - 3 Qualifiers - 2 Qualifiers - 1 qualifier

The athletes I've flagged as missing out were in the qualifying tournament and were seeded to make the quarter finals but lost out in the early rounds. That being said, looking at the entry criteria for the GS Series Final, some of them could still be in the Final if they are a pre-registered athlete.

OQT Grand Slam Champions Series Final Qualifiers - Day 1 (X) indicates the athlete's current Olympic Ranking List. Women's 49Kg 1 Alisa Angelova 2 Yanying Zhang (318) 3 Xueqin Tan (242) 4 Elif Sude Akgul (131) 5 Xiaoxue Yang (19) 6 Irina Rogozina 7 Ju Zuo (18) 8 Xiaoting Ye Women's 67Kg 1 Hyo rim Hong (18) 2 Lilliia Khuzina 3 Aaliyah Powell 4 Lauren WIlliams (14) 5 Ruth Gbagbi (4) 6 Ozoda Sobirijonova (66) 7 Milena Titoneli (9) 8 Mengyu Zhang (7) Men's 68Kg 1 Yushuai Liang (11) 2 Ilia Danilov 3 Lei Yan (461) 4 Martin Rezaei (15) 5 Abolfazl Yaghoubijouybari 6 Maksim Osin 7 Tae young Kim (36) 8 Chenming Xiao (38) Men's +80Kg 1 Yaoxi Wang (89) 2 Vladislav Larin 3 Arian Salimi (23) 4 Ivan Sapina (3) 5 Pedro Arthur Alves Jesus (155) 6 Rafail Aiukaev 7 Sanghyun Kang (12) 8 Zhaoxiang Song (8) So of the 32 qualifiers on day 1 the national breakdown is: - 11 qualifiers - 7 qualifiers - 3 qualifiers - 2 qualifiers - 1 qualifier I don't pretend to understand how the entry list for the Grand Slam Final/OQT worked but there were some pretty high ranked athletes who didn't make it through: Women's 49Kg Qing Guo (6) Mi-reu Kang (9) Women's 67Kg Cecilia Castro Burgos (10) Feruza Sadikova (12) Men's 68Kg Ho-jun Jin (5) Men's +80Kg Ayoub Bassel (16)

Both Brits bow out in the semi-finals but have done enough to qualify for the Champion Series Final.

Powell's great form continues as she too makes it into the semi-finals after a tight match against 12th seed Ozoda Sobirjonova

Williams through to the semi-finals with arguably her best match so far, taking out 3rd seed Milena Titoneli.

In a repeat of her round of 32 result, Williams progresses to the quarter finals when her opponent picks up her 5th Gam-Jeom. Not sure about Powell yet - she was leading her match when the video feed cut out

Very cagey and low scoring first fight from Powell but she overcomes Castro Burgos to make it to the round of 16. Williams also makes it through - but it was messy and resembled wrestling towards the end. She only won the second round when her opponent picked up her 5th Gam-Jeom. Based on their first bouts, Powell looks to have strongest chance to get through to the Series Final. Now I might try and catch some sleep before the afternoon session.

Yep - both in the -67Kg division