phelps

we didn't make the rules...it's all FIVB's fault... I hope we are not so stupid to think about honour and pride to come before our interest... _________________ next time FIVB should think about some better format (which would be as simple as having a full draw after the group stage*, round of 16** and quarters*** instead of a precompiled one where the teams have a chance to choose at their own convenience)... *take the 16 teams, separate them in 8 seeded and 8 unseeded teams and pair them, 1 vs 1 **take the 8 qualified teams and once again have them separated in 4 seeded and 4 unseeded and pair them, 1 vs 1 ***again, 2 seeded and 2 unseeded teams according to the combined ranking of the first phase and pair them, 1 vs 1 no protection (nor chance to choose the opponent) for any team at any level (only the chance for the hosts to play at home if more Countries are involved)...

big loss for the German team...basically, a nail on their coffin (not that they were real contenders, but still)...

since we play the very last game of the prelims, I hope our staff can make a useful counting and let us end up in the right place in the final bracket... I mean, we have to avoid places 4, 5 and 8 at any cost and hope that France and USA get one of those... tbh, we need a lot of luck to get a medal, as POL, FRA and USA are definitely stronger than us...and I don't trust our team even playing against BRA and ARG... we just need to avoid all of them until at least the semis...

I don't know if or I guess the second one is more fair, but the first one is really tempting... I'm sorry for all the Bulgarian fans...

this championship doesn't really make sense... there are 3/4 decent swimmers and then people that didn't even make the final at the Junior Europeans reaching the top 8 with more or less the same time (if not slower)... the women's 4*200m free is hilarious...Italy with the best time of the heats with 8.23 (and Vetrano swimming the last leg in 2.11 when she has a PB under 1.59)... except for Popovici (p.s. 47.37 in the relay's prelims 1st leg ), it's really not worth any waste of time...

According to the results of this and last year, this is my (quite realistic for most sports, I think) prediction for Italy Archery Hopefully this time we won't miss out on the full team. 6 athletes Artistic Swimming Unfortunately, full team is a serious threat. 8 athletes Athletics Difficult to make projections right now, it depends a lot on the relays. If we're gonna have all 4 (5, Mixed 4*400m included, which doesn't change the total number of specialists), it's already 26/28 people already (Hurdles specialists included, who might be used also for the relays). Then, we could add about 10 track runners, 5/6 Race Walk specialists, at least a couple Marathon runners and 12/15 Field specialists. 52/60 athletes Badminton I think we're going to miss out completely, here. 0 athletes Basketball I fear we won't repeat the Tokyo miracle (when we had the men's 5*5 team and the women's 3*3's). But I still hope the 5*5 men can pull out some more magic. 0/12 athletes. Beach Volleyball 2 men's teams and 1 women's should be safe, maybe we have a chance for the second women's pair, too and make it a full set. 6/8 athletes Boxing 4 girls should qualify easily (barred any political robbery, which is always behind the corner in this sport). And this time I expect also the men taking their revenge after the Tokyo shame and qualify at least 3/4 guys. 7/8 athletes Breaking I don't care. But I know that at the last World Champs we had a girl in the top 4, so maybe she can do it again. 1 athlete Canoeing-Sprint Men's C1 & C2 should qualify. I hope we can get also the men's K1. Very difficult for the men's K2, no chance for the men's K4 and the women. 4/6 athletes Canoeing-Slalom Full set in the 4 traditional competitions should be no problem this time. I don't know if we can get an extra quota in the men's Extreme. 4/5 athletes Cycling-Track Full set of 5 in both the men and women's Endurance divisions. I don't know if an extra-man is allowed when also the Madison pair is in? Miriam Vece in the women's Sprint division. And hopefully at least 1 guy in the men's Sprint division. 12/14 athletes Cycling-Road Full team or riots. Possibly an extra-man for the Time Trial event. 8/9 athletes Cycling-BMX Hopefully 1 or 2 men in the Racing division. Luckily, no chance in Freestyle. 1/2 athletes Cycling-MTB Full team , most likely. Unfortunately, these days, that only means 4 quotas. 4 athletes Diving 2 men and 2 women (if Bertocchi can stay healthy) in the Springboard events. Only 1 man and 1 woman in the Platform events, I fear. 6 athletes Equestrian Hopefully the 3 guys in the Eventing competition. At least 1 in Show Jumping (hoping that this time it's Lorenzo De Luca); very small chance to have the full team. No chance in Dressage (it looks that we don't even compete anymore on the international stage in this discipline, which isn't that bad for me). 4/6 athletes Fencing Full team or more than riots. 18 (24 with the reserves, even if they're not originally registered at the Olympic Village unless they actually play a part in the team events) athletes Field Hockey No chance among the men; very, very remote chance among the women. Realistic prediction, 0 athletes Football Super-slim chance for the girls; hopefully this time we can get back to the Olympics with the boys, as competition doesn't seem so strong. Realistic prediction, 18 athletes Golf 2 men for sure; most likely also 2 women (1 should be a lock). 3/4 athletes Gymnastics-Artistic The women's team is a lock; hopefully this time also the guys can make it with the full team. 10 athletes Gymnastics-Rhythmic Full team or riots. 7 athletes Gymnastics-Trampoline I don't care, but I read that we have a new raising super-star among the women (she won this year's junior Europeans with scores that would have given her a place right behind the senior medallists). 0/1 athlete Handball Both teams are a joke. 0 athletes Judo Hopefully 5 men and 4 women, maybe 1 more athlete through the Continental repechage quota. 9/10 athletes Modern Pentathlon 2 women should be safe; 1 or 2 men is possible (but not a lock at all). 2/4 athletes Rowing All the men's boats and at least 3 women's crews, maybe 4. 30/34 athletes Rugby 7's Let's be serious! 0 athletes Sailing Men and women's ILCA (only because of the very high number of quota places available), women's 49er FX, men and women's iQFoil, men and women's Kite, Mixed 470 and Nacra 17. 12 Athletes Shooting Full team in Shotgun or more than more than riots. at least 3 men in the Pistol disciplines; at least 1 man and 1 woman in the Rifle discipline. At least 13 athletes Skateboarding If we get 1 representative in total we're lucky. 0/1 athlete Sport Climbing 2 women and 1 man in the Combined event. At least 1 man in the Speed discipline. Hopefully, some more. 4-7 athletes Surfing If we get 1 representative in total we're lucky. 0/1 athlete Swimming Also here the relays play a big role in terms of number of athletes qualified. My guess is 4 (+ the Mixed sh*t) for Italy. And the women's 4*100m Freestyle just on the edge Therefore, I think 21/22 men and 8/13 women are a safe bet. 29-35 athletes Table Tennis Hopefully we get 1 quota place among the women. 0/1 athlete Taekwondo 2 men should be a lock. But I hope we can get 3 or 4. A single quota place among the women would be a huge success. 2/5 athletes Tennis Full team among the men (hoping that Sinner and Berrettini this time want to play the Olympic tournament). Hopefully 1 or 2 women, too (but it's gonna be difficult). 4/6 athletes Triathlon I think that in the end we'll get a quota place with the Mixed Relay, which means 2 men and 2 women in total. There's also a slim chance to get a 3rd man. 4/5 athletes Volleyball Both teams should be a lock. 24 Athletes Waterpolo Both teams should qualify this time. 26 athletes Weightlifting 3 men (61kg, 73kg, 89kg) and 2 or 3 women (49kg, 59kg, maybe also 71kg) should be within our reach. 4-5 athletes Wrestling 2 Greco-Roman and 2 men's Freestyle quota places are the max we can get, I fear. And it's already an optimistic prediction. 2/4 athletes Total : 344 - 401 athletes

This coming weekend it's time for the last stage of this year's Karate 1 Premier League in Baku. Most of the big names of the sport are expected to show up in the Azeri Capital. Karate's elite to meet in Baku for anticipated Karate 1 Premier League event

Men's Team Trap Gold: Italy Silver: Croatia Bronze: Great Britain

Women's Team Trap Gold: Italy Silver: Finland Bronze: Great Britain

Italy and Finland will shoot for Gold in the women's Team Trap competition later today; meanwhile Germany and Great Britain will shoot for Bronze. Among the men, Italy and Croatia will shoot in the Gold Medal Match; Great Britain and Germany will shoot for Bronze.

you just forgot the most important thing of them all... most likely, now they have a real chance to meet Jutta Leerdam at some gala event organized by their (common) main sponsor...

because of cultural issues... in the former Jugoslavija they always said that waterpolo isn't a woman's game (too physical and tough, according to them) and they never really tried to develop the woman's game... even the greatest coach ever, Ratko Rudic, used to say that women shouldn't play waterpolo...

Mixed Team Trap Gold: Italy 2 (Jessica Rossi & Daniele Resca) Silver: Turkey 1 (Safiye Sariturk Temizdemir & Oguzhan Tuzun) Bronze: Portugal (Maria Ines Coelho De Barros & Joao Azevedo) and Slovakia (Zuzana Rehak Stefecekova & Erik Varga)

Elite Medallists Recap Women's Downhill Gold: Valentina Holl Silver: Nina Hoffmann Bronze: Myriam Nicole Women's Downhill Gold: Loic Bruni Silver: Amaury Pierron Bronze: Loris Vergier Cross-Country Team Relay Gold: Switzerland Silver: Italy Bronze: United States Women's Cross-Country Short Track Race Gold: Pauline Ferrand Prevot Silver: Alessandra Keller Bronze: Gwendalyn Gibson Men's Cross-Country Short Track Race Gold: Samuel Gaze Silver: Filippo Colombo Bronze: Thomas Litscher Women's Cross-Country Olympic Race Gold: Pauline Ferrand Prevot Silver: Jolanda Neff Bronze: Haley Batten Men's Cross-Country Olympic Race Gold: Nino Schurter Silver: David Valero Serrano Bronze: Luca Braidot

This year's age class champions Women's Junior Downhill: Jenna Hastings Men's Junior Downhill: Jordan Williams Women's Junior Cross-Country: Monique Halter Men's Junior Cross-Country: Paul Schehl Women's Under-23 Cross-Country: Line Berquier Men's Under-23 Cross-Country: Simone Avondetto

Pauline Ferrand-Prevot put on quite a one-man show in the women's Cross Country race... all the other girls were miles behind her... meanwhile among the men, Nino Schurter did again! 10th elite world title for him after a very entertaining race and a fierce battle against Valero Serrano and, partially, Luca Braidot... Olympic Champion Tom Pidcock did ride a crazy race between moments of brilliance, moments of crisis, technical mistakes (going twice against the same tree in the wood, once even falling from his bike ) and even a tech problem that maybe cost him the bronze medal...in the end, he was 4th a good minute behind the 3rd ranked (Braidot)...

Swimming, women's 400m Freestyle...with Camille Muffat in my heart, with Ledecky being the monster she is...my pick however is Shane Gould, the woman that opened the way for the modern female swimming. Rowing, men's Four...Steven Redgrave makes automatically Great Britain my pick. Track Cycling, women's Keirin...very young event that has never been won by the best sprinter nor true discipline's specialist in the field so far...I think no one of these girls deserve to be considered among the greatest ever of the sport, therefore I pass on this event. Shooting, men's Air Rifle...no brainer, my pick is Niccolò Campriani, the best rifle shooter ever, one of the only 2 men in the history of the world cup to win at least 1 competition in each of the 3 rifle disciplines, the only man in history to make the Olympic final in all the 3 rifle discipline (and he did it twice in the same Olympics, winning 3 gold and 1 silver overall). Taekwondo, women's Flyweights...another no brainer, Wu Jingyu is definitely the best fighter in the (recent) history of this class and therefore she's my obvious pick.

news of the Summer however is Vittozzi missing only 1 prone shot in each of the 2 individual races she's done so far... (and going really, really fast on roller skis)...

Italy, Italy and again Italy... if it's not a clean sweep by the Italians, it's a scandal... atm, Sofia Raffaeli among the individuals and our group are way ahead of the rest of the field (even when they make mistakes, they're still better than anyone else)... only corrupted (not biased, it's not enough) judges can steal both the main gold medals from Italy, like they did at the Euroepan champs...

Men's Individual Trap Gold: Jiri Liptak Silver: Rickard Levin-Andersson Bronze: Nathan Hales Olympic Quota: Jiri Liptak & Rickard Levin-Andersson

Women's Individual Trap Gold: Silvana Stanco Silver: Lucy Charlotte Hall Bronze: Jessica Rossi Olympic Quota: Silvana Stanco & Lucy Charlotte Hall

unfortuantely, for now I have to go... take care of the thread!

Jessica was really lucky because Magrina lost her mind after that long review and started missing one target after another...

Rossi and Hall in the final... so, it's between 2x Italy, GBR and Spain for the 2 quota places (remember, Italy can only win 1 at best)...

luckily, no...not that bad... but the score isn't encouraging at all...