At least as many suitable as qualified athletes can enter the quota Olympic Games. The numbers tell the essentials, writes Pekka Holopainen, editor of Urheilu.
Pekka Holopainen sports reporter
19:00•Updated 19:09
The European football championships have powerfully proven that the level of the old continent in the planet’s number one sport can withstand the final tournament of 24 teams, even though half of the countries that are seriously trying to enter can participate, excluding the dwarf states. The same, if naturally narrower level is represented by the ongoing South American championship tournament.
When North America and Mexico organize the World Cup in two years, the 48-team version will be seen for the first time. When Europe gets 16 and South America 6 representatives – a total of 45.8 percent – it suddenly sounds like a lot.
Three songs from 88
But.
The World Cup has been played since 1930, and places in the medal games that is, 88 have been allocated to the top four. A total of three, 3.4 percent, of these places have gone to countries outside of Europe and South America: 1,930 to the USA, 2,002 to South Korea, and 2,022 to Morocco.
Do the 22 out of 48 competition spots on the mighty continents of the king’s game still feel like a big slice? If the competition places were allocated only according to athletic performance and not many other values, these two continents would have at least 10 additional places.
What is written above shows that even the most absolutely considered sports events in the world are always just a sample. The same is true to the greatest extent also for the Olympic Games in Paris, which start a couple of weeks after the EC final.
When globality is the lifeblood of an event, it automatically means different continent and country quotas, which in all their comprehensibility are quite top-level sports cutters.
Consider Biniam Mehar
This week, even more than half a dozen Finnish track and field athletes are still excited for their place in the Olympics. Some sneak above the finish line, some wait for it to end in big disappointment.
But for the sake of comparison, what does an endurance runner think, for example Biniam Mehary? Kaveri finished 16th in the all-time record at the 10,000 meters in Ethiopia’s Olympic qualifier on June 14 with a time of 26:37.93. However, an Olympic place, i.e. placing in the top three, would have required legs faster than 3.01 seconds.
Tamiras Tolan mind burned Ethiopia and Alexander Munyaon The Kenyan trio for the Paris Olympic Marathon. However, the quotations 2.03.40 and 2.03.11 were too light oats in this game. In the men’s marathon, 130 straight Olympic time limit breakers will be exhausted from the Olympic trios of the mentioned countries. On the women’s side, the number is no less than 147.
Gold Silver Bronze
The times of 12.37, 12.38 and 12.39 in women’s high hurdles would have been enough for gold, silver and bronze at the 2021 Olympic Games in Tokyo. In the US championships, i.e. the qualifiers, they were enough for places 4–6, so Nia Ali, Tonea Marshall mixed Kendra Harrison the next races on the NBC TV frequency.
Here is just a small, but illustrative reality about the mood of the big world.
12 of the members of Finland’s athletics team, which will probably grow to 27–28 athletes, secured their place by breaking the result limit. The Olympic quotas for athletics range from 24 to 56. In the season’s world statistics, 11 of Finland’s representatives are ranked at the top of the Olympic quota in their sport.
In swimming, the USA represents the same as Kenya and Ethiopia in endurance running. In the second individual sport of the Olympic Games, each qualifying country may nominate a maximum of two representatives per trip, one less than in athletics.
In the U.S. Olympic qualifiers, more than 20 swimmers were left out of the competition team, for whom the final level would have been the hyped-up, medal-level realism in Paris. Finland’s only sure Olympic swimmer Matti Mattsson would have been fourth in the USA qualifiers in his best time of the season.
The Paris Olympic Games will be shown on channels from July 26 to August 11.