Makedonas

NR for our girls but it was still not enough Would've been so nice to see Drasidou make it, from Drama as a swimmer to the Olympics, and she was so close but it's not happening

Gkolomeev 8th in the final, a bit disappointing to be honest. Ntountounaki ended up getting in as an alternate and got 7th instead of her usual 9th place for a change Also 9th for Makrygiannis in the men's 50 backstroke with a big PB Last day tomorrow with three events for us, all with Olympic qualification on the line - men's 400 medley (Papastamos) and the two medley relays. The most important is the women's medley relay because that would give Drasidou and Kontogeorgou spots at the Olympics. The men's medley team won't produce any new Olympians, and Papastamos will have other chances to get OQT as he did for Tokyo as well.

2024 Women's Water Polo World Championship: Semifinals: 11- 13 Third place game: 9 - 10 2024 Men's Water Polo World Championship: 5-8 Playoff: 14 - 13 5-6 Playoff: 15 - 11

Another comfortable win for us against Serbia in the 5th place game. We used to always lose to them, now we beat them at three tournaments in a row. Serbia have not won any medal since Tokyo where they beat us in the final to win gold...

Also we have Kurugliev in the 86kg final. He still doesn't have Greek citizenship though, so it's not certain if he'll be able to compete in Paris (assuming he qualifies). Honestly I don't have much interest in him, him competing for Greece just seems fake, I don't understand how people from other countries regularly celebrate these types of medals. For me it just isn't the same feeling as when "one of our own" wins something. And btw I'm fine with people like Antetokounmpo, Gkolomeev, Tzengko who all lived in Greece either from birth or shortly after, it's just Kurugliev and Walkup in basketball who came recently, were never part of the Greek system, have no Greek ancestry, don't speak the language...

Kougioumtsidis lost the bronze medal match He won gold in 2022 as a 20 yo, silver in 2023 as a 21 yo, now no medal as a 22 yo. I think his results are a bit misleading, he is still on a good path, I think he won gold too early and that maybe messed up the expectations for him.

Yeah, in situations like this it is probably better to be in the stronger group so you can avoid a tougher quarterfinal (assuming you make it out of the group).

I am well aware of the great history and tradition that Hungary has in this sport, which is why I am surprised that they see a need to naturalise foreign players! I've said the same thing about other countries in other sports (Spain in basketball with Lorenzo Brown for example), so at least I am consistent in my views. I am even annoyed when my own country does it (very rare but there are a few examples, which I won't bore you to explain the circumstances of, and no I'm not talking about the weightlifters from the Greek minority of Albania as that is a different topic). Also I was supporting Hungary at the Tokyo Olympics since Greece didn't qualify, and I wanted Hungary to finally win an Olympic medal. I was very glad when they did! The game we had against your girls here was very close which is why I said without those three non-Hungarian players, we would've won. In a game so close, the small differences are important, and I think without those players, we would've won. I still think we could've won anyways and I'm not saying it's an excuse for us losing, or the only reason why we lost, but it definitely plays a role And I'm happy for Canada because I think it is better for the sport. We saw how South Africa played in Tokyo and it was not pretty. They didn't "earn" any quota, they just got lucky that there are no other teams in Africa. It's not like Canada stole the quota from them, South Africa refused it.

A solid evening session for us. Gkolomeev into the men's 50 free final for the 6th consecutive World Championships Ntountounaki after finally making a final is now back to her typical 9th places as she lost a swim-off in the women's 50 butterfly Siskos equaled his NR from the heats to finish 6th in the men's 200 backstroke, not bad for an 18 year old! And another NR for our men's 4 x 200 freestyle relay, and 6th place in the final

Congrats to our Canadian friends! It's great to have a competitive team like Canada going to Paris instead of South Africa (in my opinion, it's better for the sport). Although of course now that Greece finally qualified again, South Africa decides to decline the quota. Why couldn't they do that for Tokyo when we were the first alternates?

Craziest ending to a game you will ever see. Very sad and a lot of our fans feel robbed by referees this tournament (both with the men's and women's teams, I barely watched so I can't comment). However our girls did really well and I think this looks good for Paris, I believe we are capable of winning a medal, we played well the games we lost and even USA has shown they are not unbeatable despite winning gold.

Honestly I am happier to finish 4th with actual Greek girls than win a medal with the United Nations team

Bronze for our Maria Prevolaraki in the 53kg. This is now her 8th European Championships medal, and she also has 3 World Championships medals. Unfortunately none of these medals have been gold! She said after Tokyo that she would go until Paris, so hopefully she can at least win an Olympic medal if she is going to end her career this year (would be her first Olympic medal).

After 5 years for Tsitsipas, and 2.5 years for Sakkari, both will exit the top 10 on Monday Sakkari has been losing early in a lot of the big events, and this week she lost to Noskova in Doha after having a match point on return and then serving for the match. Had she won she would still be top 10. However, she will likely return after Dubai because others are losing a lot of points and she isn't. Tsitsipas has not played much lately due to injury, but he seems to be finally healthy again and will playing the Mexican tournaments before Indian Wells and Miami. With basically no points to defend for the next two months, he should be back in the top 10 soon. It's just crazy that it feels like both have been in the top 10 for so long, and now they are both dropping out on the same exact day! But they will be back, I am sure!

Swimming +2 Konstantinos Englezakis (men's 4 x 200 m freestyle relay) Konstantinos Stamou (men's 4 x 200 m freestyle relay)

See you in the final and also see you in Paris! I honestly thought Hungary was safe, and that the last Olympic spot would be between Greece, Bulgaria, or Poland. I completely forgot about Lithuania and then after the Lithuanian performance in the first semifinal I thought there is no chance for us to improve our NR by 5 seconds to beat Hungary, and somehow we did it and passed not only Hungary, but several other teams

That is 17 teams, so I think Hungary are out!

7:09.90 NR for our relay! Our previous NR was 7:16.39 from 2009! Can someone confirm that we got the quota for Paris? I think we did!

take an Olympic quota in the men's 4 x 200 freestyle relay!

Gkolomeev 3rd overall in the heats with 21.70, his fastest time since Tokyo 2021

Ο Χαραλαμπόπουλος είναι πλέον 27...θυμάμαι στις ηλικιακές κατηγορίες τον είχα για ΝΒΑ. Κρίμα...

They have until the end of the qualification period to get 2 athletes with OQT? This is a problem we might have with the men's 4 x 200 free and women's 4 x 100 medley, if we qualify in these. We currently have just 1 swimmer in each relay with OQT, though some of them are in other relays but I guess that doesn't count...

Well Drakou got 5th, it seems to be our favourite position in Doha, so maybe 4th is for Canada what 5th is for Greece Siskos was 1st overall in the heats with a new NR, then 6th in the semifinal so the goal of reaching a final has been achieved. A medal seems unlikely but it would be nice for him to at least get a new NR in the final. Our women's 4 x 200 relay got 17th place with a not so great time, but it was still a new NR (barely). The girls said they expected more but that it was still a good experience for them.

Georgopoulou 202 kg, just not enough and she not improved at all in the last two years it seems. She was our last hope to send a weightlifter to Paris. Now it is 95% certain that Greek weightlifting will not be represented at the Olympics for the first time since 1956 Weightlifting is our second-best sport in our Olympic history. 5 gold, 5 silver, and 2 bronze between Barcelona and Athens and now we can't even qualify anyone. The sport has major issues but it is still sad to see how far we've fallen...

I'm glad we qualified in the mixed medley relay, and 5th in the final is pretty good for our standards regardless of it being a weak year Great also for Drakou to not only be apart of that team and secure a quota for her 4th Olympics, but also to make the final in the 50m backstroke. She hadn't made a World Championships final since 2015, so to make two (even if one is a relay) this year is nice to see, especially since this will likely be her last World Championships. Looking forward to tomorrow to see how our 18 yo talent Siskos does (men's 200 backstroke), after he was 12th last year, this can be a good chance for a final! Also looking forward to our women's 4x200 freestyle relay. They are really young and I expect a new NR. Two of the girls are 16 and one is 17 (the other is 21), and I'm glad our federation is supporting these girls so much and giving them this chance. I hope this support will continue and that they will continue to improve in the next years. They won't make it to Paris but I think we are really aiming for Los Angeles 2028 with this team (3 of them set our women's NR in this event at the World Junior Championships last year). It will also be good for Greek women's swimming, because Drakou and Ntountounaki aren't getting any younger. They won't be around forever and we need others to step up. I mentioned that Greek swimming is really improving but it's mostly on the men's side...