Makedonas

Yes but for someone like her being one of the best doubles players in the world, she would have some chances for a medal! Also it's Mertens, she plays (or at least used to) like every week in every tournament possible anyways

Afroditi Latinopoulou, who peaked in the WTA rankings in 2010 as a 19 yo at number 1067, gets elected to the European Parliament She has wins from ITF tournaments over Maria Sakkari and Valentini Grammatikopoulou

Athletics +1 Ekaterini Stefanidi (women's pole vault)

It's strange because she actually had a decent shot at a medal in mixed doubles (all of the 16 teams will have chances). It's crazy to me that athletes are able to qualify for the Olympics and choose not to go, but clearly not everyone has the same priorities. I guess that's why I'm here on a website about the Olympics and people like Elise Mertens are not

Well this doesn't take into account the players using protected rankings, but also Mertens will not play and probably not Cirstea either. Also probably some girls will get injured between now and Paris and withdraw.

Vekic isn't good on clay and won't even be seeded in singles so I don't think 3 tournaments will be much for her, but anyways Martic is 79 in singles which I don't think will be enough to get in unless there are a lot of withdrawals, probably the cutoff will be around 70 before withdrawals. Which is unfortunate because I would like to see her make the Olympics once in her career (and she will be 37 in 2028...), but also she has herself to blame for not caring to go to Tokyo when she had the ranking for it.

The new perhaps, with these 4th place finishes?

They "bend the rules" like this all the time, there are many examples, especially when a player recently rose up like O'Connell did. He spent most of this Olympic cycle out of the top 100 and only recently is now well inside the top 100. It really was not realistic for Australia to select him in Davis Cup in 2021 or 2022 for example. Badosa is a good example, she spent most of the time between Rio and Tokyo well outside the top 100, where it would have been illogical for a country like Spain with multiple higher ranked players to choose her for BJK Cup during those years, then in 2020/2021 she rose up a lot in the rankings so Spain was able to get the exception for her to go to Tokyo. Now a player like Sorana Cirstea should not get an exemption to play in Paris because she has consistently been one of Romania's top 2 players and hasn't played BJK Cup since 2018.

They are sometimes lenient with the rules, especially for a country like Australia who has many great players and probably didn't have many opportunities to be picked for Davis Cup anyways because he had other countrymen ranked higher than him!

Good to see Nacheva back and doing well, I remember her and Karydi a few years ago seemed like the future of the European women's triple jump, and Nacheva fell off for a few years and then so did Karydi, now Nacheva is thriving again, so maybe there is still hope for Karydi! Regardless it is important for Bulgaria to have another big name in athletics just as Demireva is retiring and Lalova is already retired.

Cilic hasn't played in a very long time, I thought he was injured, is he going to be healthy again? Dodig/Vekic would just miss out but there would probably be withdrawals. Without withdrawals, Pavic/Vekic would get in regardless. Is that not a possibility? Is Martic/Vekic not an option because they don't want to play together or some other reason? They would be one of the first alternates right now after GRE and ITA2, so they probably have a chance to get in the draw. I don't think Martic can make it in singles unless there are a lot of withdrawals...

Horrible evening for us First of all I didn't even know Tsoukala made the semis of the women's 100m, but out as expected, as with Gkaragkanis in the men's 200m. I was really looking forward to Emmanouilidou in the semis of the women's 100m and Zaltos in the men's hammer final. Zaltos finishing last in the men's hammer final with his worst performance of the 9 meets he's participated in so far this year... And Emmanouilidou, well she wasn't poor but she already had 11.21 in the heats so I expected something better tonight but it was 11.21 again, which is the third time she equaled her PB. I'm still waiting for her to get a new PB again but I guess I shouldn't be too greedy and remember she is only 20 yo

Does Raonic still have a protected ranking and is there a chance he'll play? Otherwise that is one less doubles team and will for sure be in.

Perhaps I misunderstood the question from @Monzanator, I thought he meant it in a way more about popularity and being seen as a hero than based on achievements alone. Galis and Dimas for example are still bigger names in Greece. Even from the current sportsmen, we have a lot of basketball players and footballers, also our two tennis stars, who get more media attention than the likes of Tentoglou, Petrounias, Korakaki, etc. To be honest athletics was more popular in Greece from 1992 to 2004, though now in recent years the sport is becoming more popular again thanks to Tentoglou and also others like Stefanidi. EDIT-I will say Tentoglou is probably our most well liked sportsman these days, because the basketball players, footballers, and tennis players have some "haters" in Greece but Tentoglou doesn't have any haters.

I also don't know if Mertens will play for example, but based on the above, here is the update for the cut-off: Burel/Parry (107) ------------------------------------------------ Grammatikopoulou/Sakkari (112) - But Sakkari said she wants to play with Papamichail, but Papamichail/Sakkari would be 117 right now, so if they don't make it then I guess she will still try with Grammatikopoulou? I'm not sure. Bronzetti/Cocciaretto (112) Bogdan/Cristian (117) Martic/Vekic (117 - will be 118 if Volynets wins today) Badosa/Bouzas Maneiro (121) Babos/Bondar (123)

Yes, it is tough to compare athletics with basketball which people in Greece follow basically all year long and is much more popular as a sport, but I think if Tentoglou can keep this up for some more years he can definitely get up there. Pyrros Dimas won 3 gold (1992, 1996, 2000) and 1 bronze (2004) in weightlifting so I think he has some work to do to catch up, a gold in Paris would be a huge step in the right direction.

Aside from Tentoglou's gold, it really hasn't been a good Championships for us. We won 5 medals in Munich (4 gold) and 6 medals in Berlin (3 gold), finishing in the top 5 of the medal table both times, but this time I don't see us coming anywhere close to that Tonight should be exciting though, with the final for Zaltos in the men's hammer and semi (and hopefully final) for Emmanouilidou in the women's 100, both are young and chasing Paris and I think they will both end up making it We had a lot of disappointments here so far, not really from medal contenders but some of our athletes chasing Olympic spots (Pesiridou, Tsiamis, Scarvelis, Dosi, Tsinopoulou, Filtisakou, Papamichail...). Also Drisbioti was disappointing but not surprising as she is just coming back from injury. Hopefully, some of our other medal hopes can convert their chances (Karalis, Tzengko, Stefanidi).

The interesting thing about Tentoglou is that he has never lost a European final. He has competed at: 2017 European U20 Championships 2018 European Championships 2019 European Indoor Championships 2019 European U23 Championships 2021 European Indoor Championships 2022 European Championships 2023 European Indoor Championships 2024 European Championships Every single time he won gold, also at the European Games if that counts

What is ironic is that our NR holder, Louis Tsatoumas, was notorious for jumping higher in qualifying rounds and smaller meets and failing in big finals. I mean who could forget in Beijing 2008 when he finished first in qualifying and then had 3 fouls in the final?!

Well for what it's worth we played two friendlies against Slovenia last summer, one in Athens and one in Ljubljana, we were without Giannis (and also without Sloukas and Calathes for example), Slovenia was with Doncic, and Greece still won both games

Anneta Kyridou, who was 10th for in Tokyo in W1X is now competing for at World Cup III in Lucerne Her and her sister had many issues with the Greek rowing federation so I guess it's not that surprising.

2024 French Open: Men's Doubles: Quarterfinals: (9) Arevalo ESA/Pavic CRO d. Tsitsipas GRE/Tsitsipas GRE 7-5 6-4

Εκτός από τον Ντόρσεϊ...

2024 French Open: Women's Singles Qualifying: Round 1: (17) Daria Snigur UKR d. Despina Papamichail GRE 7-5 6-2 Round 1: (6) Hailey Baptiste USA d. Valentini Grammatikopoulou GRE 3-6 6-4 6-3 Men's Singles: Round 1: (9) Stefanos Tsitsipas GRE d. Marton Fucsovics HUN 7-6(7) 6-4 6-1 Round 2: (9) Stefanos Tsitsipas GRE d. Daniel Altmaier GER 6-3 6-2 6-7(2) 6-4 Round 3: (9) Stefanos Tsitsipas GRE d. Zhizhen Zhang CHN 6-3 6-3 6-1 Round 4: (9) Stefanos Tsitsipas GRE d. Matteo Arnaldi ITA 3-6 7-6(4) 6-2 6-2 Quarterfinals: (3) Carlos Alcaraz ESP d. (9) Stefanos Tsitsipas GRE 6-3 7-6(3) 6-4 Women's Singles: Round 1: Varvara Gracheva FRA d. (6) Maria Sakkari GRE 3-6 6-4 6-3 Men's Doubles: Round 1: Tsitsipas GRE/Tsitsipas GRE d. Molchanov UKR/Smith AUS 7-6(9) 6-4 Round 2: Tsitsipas GRE/Tsitsipas GRE d. (4) Dodig CRO/Krajicek USA 4-6 7-5 6-3 Round 3: Tsitsipas GRE/Tsitsipas GRE d. (Alt) Guinard FRA/Jacq FRA 7-6(2) 6-2 Quarterfinals: Tsitsipas GRE/Tsitsipas GRE vs. (9) Arevalo ESA/Pavic CRO Mixed Doubles: Round 1: Shibahara JPN/Lammons USA d. Badosa ESP/Tsitsipas GRE w/o

The rankings are subject to change the next few days as people may rise/drop based on results this week. For example, there are a number of scenarios where CRO can move ahead of BRA. And yes, Salisbury/Murray and Skpuski/Evans can be done at the moment. However, a Bolelli final or Pavic semifinal would bump Skupski out of the top 10, so instead of choosing any partner in the top 300 he would have to qualify via ranking, though with Evans being ranked 62 and Skupski 11 or 12, they will just barely get in most likely.