Team
Matching
China
GIVEN its wide margin of victory over the U.S. at he 2008 Olympics,
China must still be considered the
team to beat in 2010. Especially
after the U.S. lost superstars Nastia
Liukin and Shawn Johnson. Can
Bridget Sloan and Rebecca
Bross, who went 1-2 a year ago in
London, fill the void—and make up
the difference on China?
While China should retain half its
Olympic team—He Kexin, Yang
The battle for bronze should be
just as interesting. Romania placed
third at both the 2007 worlds and
Beijing Olympics, but Russia (fourth
in Beijing) has established itself as
the top European women’s team
after its victory in Birmingham in the
spring. Romania was a distant third
at Europeans, well behind runner-up
Great Britain. And over the sum-
mer, the Romanian team lost its
leader. Head coach Nicolae
Forminte resigned after he learned
that the Romanian Federation had
solicited help from former coaches
Octavian Bellu and Mariana
Bitang. With Olympic floor champ
Sandra Izbasa still recovering from
a torn Achilles’ tendon, and new-
comer Ana Porgras slowed after
Europeans by a stress fracture in her
leg, Romania will not be as strong in
Rotterdam as it should be later in
2011.
WORLD PREVIEW
2008 Olympic champion China:Cheng Fei, Yang Yilin, Li Shanshan,He Kexin, Jiang Yuyuan, Deng Linlin
On to Tokyo
Rotterdam Team Finalists
1. China; 2. United States;
3. Russia; 4. Romania; 5.
Japan; 6. Australia; 7. Great
Britain; 8. France.
Surviving the Top- 24 Cut
Brazil, Italy, Ukraine, Germany, North Korea, Canada,
Spain, Czech Republic,
Netherlands, Switzerland,
Greece, Mexico, Belarus,
Poland, Korea, Bulgaria
Bubble Teams
Argentina, Venezuela,
Finland, Norway
Prediction
group of teams, all of which have
considerable ground to make up on
the top four.
Not that it can’t be done.
Remember Australia’s bronze in
2003, thanks in part to the 0.2
penalty China received for warming
up on the podium? (To be fair,
Australia was also less than 0.50
behind runner-up Romania.)
Other questions abound. Was
Britain’s silver in Birmingham home-cooked? Was Japan’s fifth place in
Beijing a fluke, having placed 12th
at the two previous worlds? Is
France, led by Youna Dufournet,
on the rise, and can veterans
Daniele Hypolito ( 26 on Sept. 8)
and Daiane dos Santos, 27, really
keep Brazil in the top eight?
Indeed, the 3-up-3-count team
final format that began in 2001 has
increased the element of surprise
and rendered predictions almost
pointless. That said, any of the perceived contenders possess the ability
to rally for a medal or to collapse in
utter defeat.
Which is why we can’t wait to see
how the competition ultimately
unfolds in Rotterdam.
China Syndrome
THE good news for China is that it won four apparatus men’s titles at the most
recent worlds, in 2009. The bad
news is that it needed four different
specialists to do so. Worse, among
the 74 male all-around participants
at London ’09, none came from
China.
2008 Olympic champion China:
Chen Yibing, Huang Xu, Li Xiao-peng, Xiao Qin, Yang Wei, Zou Kai
On to Tokyo
Rotterdam Team Finalists
1. China; 2. Japan; 3. United
States; 4. Germany; 5. Korea;
6. Russia; 7. Romania;
8. France.
Surviving the Top- 24 Cut
Great Britain, Spain, Switzerland, Ukraine, Belarus,
Canada, Italy, Greece, Brazil,
Puerto Rico, Australia, Netherlands, Bulgaria, Portugal,
Kazakhstan, Latvia
Prediction
Bubble Teams
Poland, Hungary, Venezuela,
Mexico
making it difficult to fill out a 3-up-3-
count team final lineup with a bunch
of specialists.
For now, China’s supremacy
seems safe. Japan, led by the phenomenal Kohei Uchimura, could
win the prelims, but China might be
more effective in the team final.
The bronze is definitely up in the
air, and most of the countries that
advance to the eight-team final will
have a chance to claim it.
That is precisely how the U.S.
surged from sixth in the 2008
Olympic prelims to grab the bronze.
Led by Jonathan Horton and
Justin Spring (now retired), the
Americans just went out and took it.
Horton was completely off his game
at the 2009 worlds, and the U.S.
will need him at his best to medal in
Rotterdam.
With its victory at the 2010
Europeans, Germany carries plenty
of momentum into Rotterdam, but
Fabian Hambüchen remains cau-
tious. “We had no mistakes [at Euro-
peans], and it’s very difficult to
repeat something like that,” he told
IG. “I think we can fight for bronze,
but not for silver or gold. Japan and
China will be too strong for every-
one.”
Russia and Korea may be two
teams on the slide, despite their
third- and fourth-place finishes in the
2008 Olympic prelims. Russia lost
its top gymnast, Yuri Ryazanov,
who died tragically in a car accident
after returning home from the
London worlds, where he had won
the all-around bronze. And after rid-
ing the talented tandem of Yang
Tae Young and Kim Dae Eun
from 2004-08, the Koreans, like
China, had no all-arounder entered
in London last October.
