Despite some disappointments the South African team has performed creditably at the Games, writes Julian Drew
WITH a return of four bronze medals at the halfway stage in the Commonwealth Games, a success-hungry South African public may have felt a little disappointed at their team’s performance in the opening five days of competition.
The truth is, however, that no matter what expectations were raised in the 112- strong squad, our athletes have done as well as could realistically have been hoped for, even in this relatively weak sporting spectacular.
Indeed, the achievements of cyclist Willie Engelbrecht in clawing his way back to a bronze medal in the men’s road race and Lizette Etsebeth, who won bronze in the women’s discus despite not featuring in the top 10 of the Commonwealth rankings this year, were an added bonus to the South African cause.
The swimming team of 19 had speculated on bringing home three medals and thus the two bronzes won by Peter Williams and Penny Heyns might be considered a failure by the uninformed.
The Commonwealth does not include many of the world’s top swimming nations but unfortunately embraces Australia, one of the world’s great powers, together with Canada and England, whose swimmers are regulars on the Olympic rostrum, and it is they who collected most of the medals.
Williams, who at 26 is in the twilight of a glorious but unheralded career, was unfortunate to find that after missing an Olympic medal in Barcelona by the narrowest of margins, two of the world’s top three 50m freestyle exponents hail from the Commonwealth.
Heyns too was up against it and her South African record in the third fastest 100m breastroke race in history, to claim a bronze behind Australians Samantha Riley and Rebecca Brown, was a superb performance . It will put her in the right frame of mind to tackle next month’s infinitely more competitive Rome world championships.
While the efforts of Heyns and Williams were a highpoint of the Games, what should set alarm bells ringing throughout South African sport is the failure of many of the South African competitors to reach their true potential at a major championship like this.
Far too many athletes failed to match the form which saw them selected for the trip to Canada, particularly in swimming and athletics, where performance levels are more easily gauged, and this must reflect on the coaching methods employed in this country.
Although South Africa faces the disadvantage of having its athletics season out of sync with the main season in the rest of the world, many other southern hemisphere countries face the same problem and manage to get their athletes to peak at championships.
It is an issue which needs some serious thought from sports administrators if local athletes are ever to achieve true potential without leaving these shores to find a home and proper help elsewhere.
With the bowlers and the rest of our athletics team adding their efforts to the final medal tally, South Africa should still return home with at least the 10 medals predicted by Sam Ramsamy when the Games close on Sunday.