London 2012 Summer Olympics (article continued)

A lot happened during this year’s Olympics games. The games started 2 days before the actual opening ceremony (July 27th) with preliminary matches for the Women and Men’s football respectively. From that first event till the very last day (August 12th), records were being broken, new world records were being set and emotions were running sky high. Like Cristiane Rozeira de Souza Silva of the Brazil’s women’s football team who set the record for the most goals scored by a woman in the Olympics when she scored her 11th Olympic goal on the 25th of July.

Her record was closely followed by South Korean team that not only set a new world record for men’s Archery competition but also produced the individual world record (by Im Dong-Hyun - legally blind competitor) of 699 points for 72 arrows on the day of the opening ceremony. Let’s not forget the athletes that got disqualified and sent home for tweeting unpleasant comments about other competing athletes and the many drug-tests to ensure athletes were not depending on performance enhancement drugs. But what people were looking forward to was which country would go home with the most medals and if their country would get medals in the particular sports they participated in.

As a Nigerian, I was proud to see we had our first ever Kayak representative (Jonathan Akinyemi) and a Basketball team in addition to the usual squads of athletes for athletics, wrestling, Taekwando, Boxing, Table Tennis and weightlifting categories. Most of our athletes held great promise (like Blessing Okagbare who was Africa’s fastest female athlete in the 100m category), but in the end, we were left a tad bit disappointed as none of our finest athletes were able to clench a single medal in this year’s Summer Olympics.

Nigerians vented their disappointment through various social media but little did we know we would have a second chance with the just concluded London 2012 Para-Olympics. We won 13 medals (6 gold, 5 silver and 2 bronze) in Power lifting and set new world records through athletes such as Yakubu Adosokan, Esther Oyema, Joy Onaolapo and Folashade Oluwafemiayo. (more on this later). Too bad we can’t participate in the London 2012 Winter Olympics since we experience no winter season in Nigeria.

Now back to the London 2012 Summer Games. Our basketball didn’t do too badly, despite the record breaking match played against the USA. While the American team made the record of the most points ever scored in an Olympics basketball game, Nigeria made the record of the highest scores ever earned by an African Basketball team in an Olympic match.

Don’t forget we also had player with the second highest score by an individual (Ike Diogu-27points) in that particular game even though an American Player (Carmelo Anthony -37points) broke the former Olympic record of the most points scored by an individual which was set in 1988 by a Brazilian player ( -31points). What I hated most was when some of the athletes suddenly began admitting that they were not home based players and blaming their poor performance on the poor support from the Nigerian government as if that would excuse their failure in securing a gold medal.

From what I saw, the athletes who did exceedingly well in the games were people who had a personal stake in their success like Michael Phelps, Usain Bolts and even 16-year old Shiwen Ye. Anyway, like I said on twitter, we (Nigerians) should be grateful we even had a team to represent the country at such an international sporting event.

UEFA Champions League 2012 from a spectator’s viewpoint

So I’m not a zealous football fan and my loyalties to the club of my choice can be questionable, but I do love to watch a good match. The final of the 2012 UEFA Champions league was such a match for me. Having the five times UEFA champions Bayern Munich play against Chelsea, a newbie to the European champions winning streak, the match could easily have been a done deal in regards to who could win. Initially when the game started, the 76% ball possession as well as the 13 on target shots by Bayern gave Munich supporters the hope that Bayern would walk away with the cup. As a sucker for the underdogs, I cheered for Chelsea whose 71% ball possession revolved around defense. The fatal flaw on Bayern’s side began when Bayern’s striker, Thomas Muller who scored the first goal of the match in the 84th minute, was substituted with defensive midfielder just about 8minutes before the end of the game. How incredulous was that? Everyone knows the end of a match is the most crucial time where a team has to be at its best.

Last minute goal surprises are not news to the world of football. Just when Bayern got comfortable, Drogba turned the tides by scoring an equaliser in the 88th minute. Chelsea who had strategically played defense the entire time was suddenly energized and the usual suspense that accompanies great matches began to keep the like of me at the edge of our seat. Before we knew it, we were on an emotional roller coaster with Chelsea and the entertainment factor of a good football match kicked in with Chelsea players picking up 2 yellow cards, 1 missed free kick and 1 awesome penalty save by Peter Cech. Bayern’s offside goal by Franck Ribery was quite a disappointment for Bayern supporters who were so sure their team would pick up the pace and strike back especially since they were playing at home.

The 30 minutes extra time led the 1-1 goal stalemate to the dreaded moment, penalty shoot outs. By this time, BB display messages reeked with excitement as non-football fans joined the guessing game for how the playoffs would be in BB chat groups. Chelsea fans wasted no time in broadcasting messages of symbolism such as the founding of Chelsea in 1905 and the date of the present match which was 19-05-2012. Statistics showed that Bayern had a better chance of winning based on penalties as has been done 5 previous matches while the odds were against Chelsea because the two matches they had played that ended in a penalty was a no-win for them. Chelsea started on a bad note with a miss, I found myself praying for a miracle but when Bayern Munich missed twice, I screamed for joy as the journey to the champions’ cup for Chelsea had its happy ending.

With a grueling journey which began with Chelsea making it only as far as the quarter finals in 2000, also to the semi final match in 2004 and ultimately losing at the 2008 finals, it would seem Chelsea were destined to win even though Bayern was the better team for the night. With Chelsea going home with not only the engraved silverware trophy and gold medals but also billions of dollars, all we spectators can say is “All is well that ends well”. In the end, we are left with two moral lessons from this year’s champions (who have joined the list of 10 teams to win the trophy at least once) which are: never quit trying and taking chances/risks because the reward is guaranteed success.