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| Wednesday, 18 August 2004 |
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Athletes off the blocks tomorrow Dinesh Weerawansa reporting from Athens ATHENS, Tuesday - The much looked forward to athletic calendar of the XXV111th summer Olympic Games here would commence tomorrow (18) at the Olympic Stadium with the cream of world class competitors in action. Track and field has been Sri Lanka's forte in the international arena, be it Olympics, Asian Games or even South Asian Games. But the interest among sports fans back in Sri Lanka were somewhat reduced with star woman sprinter Susanthika Jayasinghe making a controversial pull out. Nevertheless, the four Sri Lanka athletes remaining in the fray - Damayanthi Darsha (women's 400m), Rohan Pradeep Kumara Fernando (men's 400m), Anuradha Indrajith Cooray (men's marathon) and Manjula Kumara Wijesekera (men's high jump) are determined to make the Indian ocean island's presence felt. Sri Lanka will come to the Olympic track with happy memories they had at the last Olympic Games in Sydney four years ago. It was in the New South Wales capital that Jayasinghe rewrote the century year old Olympic Games history becoming her country's first female medalist and only the second medalist ever. There were celebrations all over as Jayasinghe came third in women's 200m final to take the bronze medal - Sri Lanka's first in 52 years after the Duncan White's feat in London, 1948 in men's 440 yards hurdles. But Jayasinghe's historic feat is now history and most people back home think there is something fishy behind the controversial pull out of the 28-year-old woman sprinter from Warakapola who rewrote her country's sports history by winning silver, Sri Lanka's first ever, at the 1997 IAAF`World Championships here in the Greek capital. But today at the same historic city, Jayasinghe lives defeated and disappointed with loads of criticism from her home media. The opening day's athletic calendar on Wednesday would get start with the women's shot putt qualifying round at 8.30 a.m. local time (11.30 a.m. SL time), followed by the men's shot putt qualifying round at 10.30 a.m. (1.30 p.m. SL time). The finals of the two events would be worked off at 4 p.m. (7 pm SL time) and 5.30 p.m. (8.30 p.m SL) time). Those are the only athletic events scheduled for tomorrow while Thursday will be a rest day. The athletic calendar will run for 11 successive days uninterrupted from Friday. The second day schedule of athletics will be on Friday where Manjula Kumara Wijesekera and Rohan Pradeep Kumara Fernando would be seen in action. Manager of the Sri Lanka athletic team, commodore Shemal Fernando said the Lankan athletes are ready for the hurdles and have been training hard since their arrival here nine days ago. Fernando said the early arrival has given a good opportunity for the athletes to familiarise with the local conditions. There are about 600 Sri Lankan families living in and around Athens but they are dejected to hear that Jayasinghe is not competing in women's 100m event. Most of them had expected that Jayasinghe would come out with a memorable run as she did here exactly seven years ago. But many of them have already purchased high demand weekend tickets to see Sri Lankan athletes in action on Friday and Saturday. |
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