Perfs of the day
Sports co. There is a lack of superlatives in front of the overall performance of the French team sports teams. Three finals, three medals guaranteed. It remains to determine the metal. The prize goes this time to the basketball players, winners with the knife of the Slovenian prodigy Luka Doncic and his teammates (90-89). The last action looks like a miracle. Possession is Slovenian and Klemen Prepelic thinks of registering the winning basket on the buzzer. This is without counting on the counter-rage of Nicolas Batum. France will be in the final against the United States on Saturday, twenty-one years after Sydney. Read the report from our special correspondent in Tokyo.
On the hand side, performance is also measured by consistency at the highest level. Thanks to a breathtaking Vincent Gérard in the cages, the Blues extricated themselves from the Egyptian trap and qualified for their fourth Olympic final in a row. No nation had yet succeeded in doing so on the Games stage. “We must not trivialize all of this. Especially after the season we have lived ”, implores Luka Karabatic. The last step will be Saturday against the Danes. Read the report from our special correspondent in Tokyo.
The feat of volleyball players was Tuesday against the Poles. This Thursday, against Argentina who had beaten them during the group stage, Laurent Tillie’s men did not give details and won without trembling three sets to zero (25-22, 25-19, 25-22). The Blues will face the Russian Olympic Committee (ROC) on Saturday at 2.15pm, which won earlier in the day against Brazil.
Karate. “On a cloud.” Karateka Steven Da Costa didn’t miss his chance and won gold in the under 67 kg category. At the age of 24, he became the first Olympic medalist in the history of French karate, when he made his Games debut in Nippon Budokan, a mythical temple of martial arts. But this sport is not on the Paris-2024 program.
Athletics. Injured in the back on the first day of the decathlon of the Tokyo Games, Kevin Mayer sought courage for a silver medal, as in Rio, five years ago, but under very different circumstances. The gold goes to Canadian Damian Warner. The leader of French athletics had started with great difficulty Wednesday the first tests of the competition. This Thursday he made up part of his delay, notably beating his personal best in the javelin (73.03 meters). “I did test after test, I didn’t know when it was going to fail. It did not give up “, he reacted.
Football. It is a rare gesture that will not fully console Megan Rapinoe, the super star of the American football team, a selection that could not have done better than a bronze medal. But the player offered a direct corner, opening the score to the key, in the small final won against Australia (4-3).
Disappointments
Track cycling. World champion in 2017 and 2020, Benjamin Thomas was aiming for gold in the omnium race. He finished chocolate, in fourth place in an event won by Briton Matthew Walls. The omnium is a bit like the decathlon of track cycling. Four separate events, run in a peloton on the velodrome, all condensed over barely three hours. A combined registered since 2012 only in the Olympic program. Second after the first test (the scratch), co-leader after the tempo race, Benjamin Thomas left some feathers in the spectacular elimination race – where the riders turn in a peloton and sprint every two laps, the last to cross the line being eliminated until only two “survivors” remained – and fell off the podium in the points race, the fourth and final round of this combined.
Athletics. They have hit rock bottom. The men’s 4x100m relay from the United States, made up of Trayvon Bromell, Fred Kerley, Ronnie Baker and Cravon Gillespie, suffered yet another failure at the Olympic Games on Thursday, missing the qualification for the final after a disappointing performance (sixth in 38 min and 10 sec). “Embarrassing and unacceptable”, reacted Carl Lewis, the legend of US athletics (nine gold medals between 1984 and 1996).
Decryption
Chronos. World records in the 400 m hurdles sprayed, Olympic record in the 100 m women… The fault of the climate? To technology? To the quality of the track at these Olympics? The public does not witness it. The stands remain silent. Indifferent. But something has been happening at the Olympic Stadium in Tokyo since the start of the track and field events. Records fall as if under grape-shot. The stopwatch panics. Athletes write history, sometimes together. Lighting from our athletics specialist in Tokyo.
Requiem. Times have changed, so has the IOC. The 50 km walk, the longest event in athletics, is no longer in line with broadcasters’ expectations and will disappear from the Olympic program at the end of the Tokyo Games. “Endurance is no longer in the air. Today, the new watchword is: shorter, faster, more fun ”, deplores Robert Korzeniowski, the legend of the discipline, the only athlete to have achieved an Olympic double (Sydney 2000 and Athens 2004). Our article.
Slovenia. Basketball, cycling, canoeing, skiing, climbing … With its two million inhabitants, Slovenia competes in many sports with the best nations. “Thirty years ago, we weren’t at all confident. Everyone was happy if we brought back just a medal from the Games, analyzes Matej Tusak, sports psychologist who has worked with many Slovenian stars. Today we have high expectations and it has become normal for Slovenia to be world or Olympic champions. ” Our lighting.
Program: in Tokyo, it’s already tomorrow
Sports co. As brilliant as the boys, the French basketball players and handball players are back on the floors on Friday, a place in the final at the key. The proteges of Valérie Garnier, who crossed the Spanish obstacle in the quarter-finals after an unbreathable suspense, will be opposed to Japan (kick off at the Saitama Super Arena at 8 p.m., 1 p.m. in France). In hand, after having eaten the Dutch world champions, the Blue will meet the Swedes at the Yoyogi National Stadium at 5 p.m. (10 a.m. in France). In the group stage, the two teams neutralized each other (28-28).
Athletics. The Dutch Sifan Hassan is engaged in a crazy bet: the treble over 1,500, 5,000 and 10,000 meters. She has already taken gold on the 5,000. She will be in the 1,500 final on Friday (departure around 9:50 p.m., 2:50 p.m. in France).
Medal table
With the gold of Steven Da Costa and the silver of Kevin Mayer, France now has 27 medals, including 7 in gold (the karateka Steven Da Costa, the shooter Jean Quiquampoix, the French men’s foil team and the swordsman Romain Cannone in fencing, the mixed team and Clarisse Agbegnenou in judo and the duo Matthieu Androdias-Hugo Boucheron in rowing), 11 in silver (Kevin Mayer in the decathlon, the swimmer Florent Manaudou, the judokas Amandine Buchard, Sarah-Léonie Cysique and Madeleine Malonga, windsurfers Charline Picon and Thomas Goyard, the French women’s foil team and the French women’s saber team in fencing, the French rugby sevens team and rowers Laura Tarantola and Claire Bové) and 9 in bronze (the sailors Camille Lecointre and Aloïse Retornaz in sailing, the team sprint riders, the eventing riders, the judokas Teddy Riner, Romane Dicko and Luka Mkheidze, the mixed triathlon team, the taekwondoist Althéa Laurin, the fencer e Manon Brunet). France goes back to eighth place in the standings.
Chronicle “in the Olympic bubble”
In Tokyo for the Games, our special correspondent Romain Métairie tells the story of adventure within adventure.
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