Despite the decidedly shaky run-up to the Rio Olympics, when nothing seemed to be going right for the Brazilian organisers, the games themselves have run relatively smoothly.

Yes we’ve had some obvious organisational failures, not least of which was the diving pool changing a rather eerie shade of green. I know of at least half a dozen Maltese pool companies that could have sorted that little problem out for them overnight. Yet, somehow the Brazilians managed to drag it on for a week.

But for the most part, people will take away traditional Olympic memories from Rio: world records being broken, tragic near misses, unfortunate injuries, surprise victories, unexpected failures and glorious team triumphs.

Personally speaking I enjoyed watching Team GB exceed their expectations, make breakthroughs in disciplines like gymnastics and continue their dominance of sports like cycling.

I have to admit that the controversy over the British cyclists, with some of their rivals suggesting they cheated, did raise a chuckle. Britain’s dominance in this sport has nothing to do with bending the rules, but everything to do with forward planning and resource management.

After a dismal performance at the Atlanta games when they only managed one gold medal in total, the British sporting authorities decided it was time to focus their funding.

Instead of throwing a bit of money at a lot of sports, they threw a lot of money at a few sports where they believed they had the best chance of success. Rowing was one of these sports and cycling was another.

That extra investment in specific disciplines has been paying off for the last decade or so. Great Britain’s track and field successes are few and far between, but those in the areas they targeted are substantial. Cycling possibly more than any other.

For their rivals to insinuate that this is down to cheating is utterly laughable and reeks of some very sour grapes.

Talking of sourness, one thing about these Olympics that has left a bit of a bad taste in my mouth is the fact that we weren’t able to watch our Maltese athletes compete.

William Chetcuti, to pick the obvious example, was one of the favourites for a medal in the double trap, yet there was no (legitimate) way of watching him compete.

Surely if we are serious about encouraging our children to participate in different sports other than the traditional big hitters like football, then we need to be exposing them to events like the Olympics.

And surely it is only right that we should be given the opportunity to watch our best sportsmen, like Chetcuti, on the biggest stage of all.

Yes I know RAI had their coverage of the games. But that was obviously focussed on those events where the Italians had the best chances of success; fencing and volleyball by the looks of it.

If our national broadcaster can afford to shell out good money for the rights to Euro 2016, which obviously didn’t involve a single Maltese player, then surely they could have found a bit of extra cash to ensure we got to watch our own athletes in the Olympic Games.

And if they couldn’t find the cash then it should have been up to the government to step in and make something happen.

A lesson that will be learned, hopefully, in time for Tokyo 2020.

One of my favourite moments of the  Olympics involved road cycling gold medallist Anna van der Breggen.

The Dutch cyclist claimed gold after team-mate Annemiek van Vleuten  suffered an horrific crash on a slippery downhill while leading the race by 10 kilometres.

Obviously Van der Breggen had to cycle past Van Vleuten’s crumpled body of  as she lay motionless on the roadside before being taken to hospital and put in intensive care.

After the race, Van der Breggen said: “I thought she was dead”.

But that horrific thought didn’t prompt her to stop to shed a few tears for her apparently deceased colleague. No, she just kept on pedalling to claim a gold.

I’m not entirely sure Ms van der Breggen really captured the Olympic spirit when she capitalised on on her “dead” teammate’s misfortune…

Conte’s got Wengeritis

New season. New manager. Same old Diego Costa.

The first game of the season and he has already smothered himself in a cloud of controversy. He may have scored Chelsea’s winner against West Ham United last Monday, but there aren’t many people who believe he should have been on the pitch to do so.

Already booked in the first half, he lunged in on Hammers’ goalkeeper Adrián with the sort of tackle that could easily have broken a leg. Somehow the referee decided it wasn’t worthy of a second yellow and, instead of soaking in the bath, Costa was on hand to score the 89th minute winner.

Worryingly, Antonio Conte supported his controversial striker, saying the referee made the right decision: “I saw Costa put the pressure on the keeper and then try to stop.”

Replays clearly show that stopping was the last thing on Costa’s mind. I’m not saying it was a deliberate attempt to hurt his opponent, but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t an awful tackle.

Don’t tell me Conte is another  manager who can’t see wrong in his own players. The Premier League has enough of those already… with Arsene Wenger their revered leader.

Best form of defence

If you think your team is having a poor start to the season (and mine certainly is) spare a thought for Blackburn Rovers.

Actually, even though Blackburn are bottom of the Championship, you should really spare your thoughts for their defender Shane Duffy.

Last Saturday, Duffy scored an own goal in the team’s 3-0 defeat by Wigan Athletic. Quite depressing.

But last Tuesday he showed he was actually better than that in the game against Cardiff – by scoring two own goals in the 2-1 defeat.

No satisfied with his scoring exploits he then proceeded to get himself sent off in the final minutes of the game. Talk about a crappy start to the season.

There is, however, one positive he can take from this nightmare start: going into this weekend’s matches he is joint top scorer in the Championship. Every cloud, as they say.

It’s just a thought, but Blackburn manager Owen Coyle might want to think about starting Duffy as a striker when he returns from his ban.

Partly because there is a chance he can replicate his scoring exploits at the other end of the pitch, but mostly because he should be able to do less damage to his own team all the way down there…

sportscolumnist@timesofmalta.com
Twitter: @maltablade

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