When he had to do two penalty rounds after the second stop at the shooting range, it was clear that the race was lost for the Northerners. “Good night, Sweden,” said Ola Bränholm, a commentator for SVT television, who also drove the viewers away from the live broadcast, describing the race as a “nightmare”.
Immediately after the Femling debacle, the shooting coach of the Swedish team, Jean-Marc Chabloz, was scratching his head in the direct TV entrance. “I have a very small board to show where Peppe’s blows were going. Unfortunately. It seemed to me that he started to panic,” Chabloz glossed over the efforts of his charge, who really missed a lot.
“There was a problem right from the beginning of the item. He couldn’t get into a rhythm at all,” the coach continued.
Femling “infected” his colleagues with his miserable performance, and the Swedes ended up with the worst shooting balance of the entire starting field in the form of 14 reloads and three penalty rounds.
“It boils inside me. At the same time, I started exactly as I wanted, the layup was fine, the handstand was bad from the very beginning. I do not know why. When things start to go wrong, you get under pressure,” explained the 30-year-old Femling.
Photo: Vesa Moilanen, ČTK/AP
Norwegian Vetle Sjaastad Christiansen at the head of the relay at the WC in Kontiolahti.Photo: Vesa MoilanenČTK/AP
And he had no explanation either because his aim was so bad that it was impossible to even trace the impact of his shots. “I do not know what to say. It wasn’t good,” he lamented.
The complete destruction of the Swedish team was at least cosmetically improved by star Sebastian Samuelsson, who finished in tenth place.
