OlympicsFan

What about the progression of the american record in the steeplechase, almost as bad if you ask me (same is true for what Houlihan is doing in the 1500/5000 m).

And thats just your opinion. Jebet just has been called out and now someone doesnt just break her world record, but by 8 seconds, i hope that records like that keep coming so that the same thing that happened in cycling will also happen in athletics. TV stations will hopefully drop athletics events from their broadcast so IAAF will be forced to do something. I know that the situation in cycling is probably even worse now then when Lance was doing his thing and that the doping never stopped, but at least the riders (mostly) tried to make their performances seem realistic. As a person who cares about justice, many of those performances in athletics currently just have to make you sick.

Amazing result for this young team with two 24 year olds, wonder if Deußer and Ahlmann can get back into the team. Hopefully they will perform the same way at the worlds.

Exceted about the german future in this sport. Men's eight and women's quadruple sculls are where they should be and finally a great talent in men's single sculls, only men's quadruple sculls is a bit worrying. I thought that Naske would end the german drought in men's single sculls, but apparently it will be Zeidler. Considering the age of the other top guys and the fact that Zeidler started rowing only 18 months ago, i see a good chance for him to medal in 2020, winning the first german medal in men's single sculls since 2000 and maybe even the first german gold in this event since 1992. Now that the qualification for the world championships is over, i hope that Naske and the second german team in women's quadruple sculls will be used to strengthen other boats.

I expected nothing less from the french people, they are world famous for behavior like that. Probably will find a reason to make this day a national holiday, so that they can work even less.

Quality-wise a really poor tournament with almost all big teams (except for France) flopping. In major leagues there are just too many games, it's probably no coincidence that the 2nd youngest team won. Let's hope that players will be less exhausted in 2022. France was the best team and deserved the title, they will only get better and will be the team to beat in the future. For me it's still weird to see so many players with a foreign background in their team, i would imagine it's hard to identify with this team for many white people in France. I know that France has a lot of people with a foreign background, but not clearly over 50% as in their football team. Mbappe of course was the best young player and Courtois was the best goalkeeper. Hard to tell who was the best player, noone really stood out.

How was it a revenge when the girl that beat her last weak didnt compete here?

Female players who won 3 different slams in the open era (without achieving the career grand slam): Virginia Wade, Martina Hingis, Lindsay Davenport, Monica Seles, Hana Mandlikova, Evonne Goolagong Cawley, Justine Henin, Angelique Kerber Female players who won Wimbledon, the US Open and the Australian Open, but not the French Open in the open era: Virginia Wade, Martina Hingis, Lindsay Davenport, Angelique Kerber (On the mens side: Boris Becker, Arthur Ashe, Jimmy Connors, Pete Sampras, Stefan Edberg) Female players who won the career grand slam in the open era: Billie Jean King, Serena Williams, Maria Sharapova, Steffi Graf, Martina Navratilova, Chris Evert (On the mens side: Andre Agassi, Novak Djokovic, Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal) Kerber is just one French Open title away from becoming the 7th female player in the Open Era to win the career grand slam, something even Justine Henin, Kim Clijsters, Jennifer Capriati, Monica Seles, Lindsay Davenport, Venus Williams and Martina Hingis didn't accomplish. This would also make her only the 11th player (male or female) to accomplish this in the open era.

Really strange to see ireland suddenly turning into an athletics powerhouse ...

Very sad that the german team threw away a silver medal in the 4 x 400 m womens relay by not using Scheppan. Congrats to China for gold in mens discus throw!

If 3:32 will be enough to win gold in womens 4 x 400 m relay, the german coaches should be fired. With Scheppan and Schwab this relay could go at least 3:32.

You mean like at the world indoors this year?

Very happy for Riecke, not easy to jump a PB under those conditions, hopefully she will continue to improve and go even further at the U20 euros next year. Also very happy for Zeney. Both south african 400 m hurdles world champions from last year have made an amazing progression. Given the current situation in south africa, i am delighted to see a white athlete doing great for them. Tomorrow could bring two golds for Germany, both relays are (clear) favorites. Sadly the womens relay doesn't have Prepens in it, with her instead of Dönicke they should have gone 0,2 - 0,3 faster, which still wouldnt have been enough to break their own world record of course.

It's great to see how happy those girls are during the victory ceremony (100 m). I know that some people want to get rid of this format and there are certainly problems, but i would find it really sad if officials would take such a great opportunity away from those kids. Let's face it, most of them will never do anything at senior level, so this is a once in a lifetime chance for them.

We are heading for a Williams vs. Ostapenko final, which also would be the most exciting final with the players that are left. Ostapenko and Kasatkina will face in one semifinal, while Bertens and Williams will face in the the other. Kerber is a perfect match-up for Kasatkina, hard to see Kasatkina not routining her.

So ... ? He also faced a much weaker field. I think if Zverev would have been born 10 years earlier, he would have had a career like Berdych at best. Maybe he will become world number 1 (depending on how soon Federer and Nadal will retire), but he won't win a slam.

5-time olympic champion Hans Günter Winkler has died at the age of 91.

Williams and Ostapenko are the favorites, but i would prefer to see Bencic winning it.

Why?

Quiet interesting ... When the Netherlands failed to qualify, german fans made fun of the dutch fans/team, then Germany failed to make it out of the group and the dutch/brazilian people made fun of them. We have to believe that Belgium eliminating Brazil was karma, the same would be true for Belgium winning the world cup (concerning the dutch fans). Belgium seems to be on a mission to revenge german "enemies". It's destiny for Belgium to win it, there is no way around it.

Sadly i couldn't watch any of the games, so the following opinion will only be based on highlights: France vs. Uruguay: Expected winner, although both goals were rather out of nowhere. Apparently Mbappe learned the wrong things from Neymar, but unlike him he has still enough time to grow-up. Belgium vs. Brazil: Surprising winner, apparently the absence of Casemiro hurt Brazil more than most people thought. I am happy that Clownmar is out, but on the other hand Brazil clearly got screwed by not getting a penalty when Kompany fouled Jesus. Absolutely shocking "mistake" by the referee/VAR. England vs. Sweden: Another goal after a set piece for England, nothing new. Sweden didn't look as aggressive in defense as in previous games, maybe they were tired or the absence of Lustig hurt them. Croatia vs. Russia: After the group stage noone would have thought that Croatia would need 2 penalty shootouts to beat Russia and Denmark, but those games showed that they clearly have a problem with breaking down defensive teams. On the one hand i am sad that the host is out, on the other hand i am happy that Russia is out. Their first penalty was absolutely shocking, possibly the worst penalty since Zaza's penalty against Germany. Surprisingly overall the matches were less close than in the previous round. In the round of last 16 only one game was won by more than 1 goal, in the quarterfinal 2 games were won by more than 1 goal. Still no team played brilliantly at this world cup so far, most goals are scored by coincidence, after set-pieces or after goalkeeper mistakes. Most games are very close but not on a very high level in my opinion. Predictions: France vs. Belgium is at least 60/40 for France in my opinion. The french defense is just much better and they have better alternatives on the bench. For me they are still the clear favorite to win this tournament and this game might very well be something like an early final (although the same has been said at 2016 european championships and then Portugal won the title). Croatia vs. England: I think England is the favorite in this match (croatian players will surely be exhausted), although i hope that England won't make it, but i don't really see Croatia beating them. I never would have thought that one of those teams would make the final, but both had an incredibly easy draw (although probably not as easy as the draw for Germany in 2002). I think it would only be "fair" if either France or Belgium would win the title, they just had a much more difficult path to the final. As long as neither England nor Croatia win their first world cup here i will be fine. Personally i would prefer to see Belgium winning it, since France just has too many annoying players and the french team is bound to get even better in the next couple of years, so they will get enough chances in the future to win some big titles, while a chance like that might not present itself again for Belgium.

Zverev at slams ... I think i saw someone predicting some weeks ago that no player born in the 1990s will ever become world number 1 and i am starting to believe it. Zverev or Shapovalov could do it of course, but i think in the long run Kuhn, Auger-Aliassime and maybe even Molleker will turn out as better talents (at least comparing to Zverev). Kerber and Görges are still in, but i think at least one of them will go out in the next round. Bencic is one of the worst possible opponents for Kerber (alongside Svitolina and Muguruza) and Görges can basically lose to anyone.

So far the overall level has been rather disappointing indeed. Of course Milak, Kolesnikov and Kesely are only doing as much as they have to. Apart from those 3 i don't see many talents who are likely to become world-class. Of course it doesn't help that talents like Anderson, Large, Gose, Shkurdai or Minakov don't seem to have improved much lately. I think especially in men's IM and women's freestlye sprint/back/fly the situation is worrying from a european point of view. We didn't have many breakout performances so far, i don't really see any on the women's side so far and on the men's side i would say only Daniel, Dean and maybe Burdisso (although for him it has been more of a breakout year, i am not sure whether his 200 fly time was even a PB for him). For me clearly the most positive thing has been to see that Israel suddenly has some great talents, especially in men's freestlye, but also in women's 200 IM. Switzerland also has been surprisingly good. The biggest disappointment so far has been Spain. Men's 200 m free tomorrow should be great. From a german perspective the biggest disappointment has been men's 100 fly and there weren't many positive surprises to be honest. The weakness on the men's side is worrying, the same is true about the non-existent improvements of Gose and Tobehn (the two biggest talents in this age group).

Best results so far in my opinion: On the men's side: 110 m hurdles Hammer throw Javelin throw On the women's side: 3000 m Hammer throw Heptathlon The biggest mystery so far for me has been GB in the sprints. Where are all their talents in the sprints? In many races they don't even have starters ... Germany is absolutely shocking in throwing events, but that clearly is a trend. Personally i prefer for example 3 medals in track events over 8 medals in throwing events, but most german people probably disagree. From a german perspective my highlights so far have been the silver for Marie Scheppan in women's 400 m (fastest time for a german U20 runner in this century for 17 yo Scheppan) and the gold for Leni Wildgrube in the pole vault who improved her PB by 6 cm. We might even see Scheppan at the senior european championships as part of the 4 x 400 m relay.

She is with Jozy Altidore now ... (she could do much better imo, but the same would be true if she would be with Sock)