2008 Beijing Olympics Thread

catbox_9 wrote:

The greatest soccer team ever, Brazil, has once again failed in their quest for Olympic gold losing 3-0 to Argentina. They have never won this tournament. They really wanted it this year - they even let Ronaldinho play.

Argentina has an awesome team in Beijing. Riquelme, Aguero and of course Messi... Ronaldinho can't beat these guys on his own. All the big stars had to play for their clubs in the different european leagues (season just started now).

Oh i missed these soccer discussions with you catbox. :lol:

I don't really like Olympic soccer. It's what, an under-21 competition (or is it 23?). That's fine, but then each team gets 3 exemptions which totally defeats the purpose of an age limit. That would be like having college baseball where each team can also have 3 major leaguers. Nobody would watch it. Either make it open to everyone, or only the young players. Either way, but pick one!

And I'm still mad about USA-Nigeria. You don't get a red card 4 minutes in. A draw and the US makes it to the quarterfinals and Nigeria would have been eliminated. Nigeria will play Argentina for the gold. The US may be bad at soccer, but since the Olympics is so small they're usually halfway respectable there.

Actually, Olympic soccer tends to have some strange teams win. In 2000 the US got 4th place losing the Bronze to Chile (since when were they a soccer power?) and the winner was Cameroon :haha:

Not Olympic related (although I'll try and fix that) but Spain is #1 in the FIFA rankings!!!

They didn't make the Olympics though

Whoa! This is confusing. The Euro Under-21 tournament is what picked the 4 qualifying teams. England made the final 4 but since they compete in the Olympics as Great Britain they were ineligible to compete as there is no Great Britain team (Scotland and Wales also have international teams which compete in the Olympics as G.B. - N. Ireland has one, too but their athletes pick Ireland or G.B. to compete for).

Spain didn't even qualify for that tournament - in other words, they didn't qualify to attempt to qualify. In the first round of qualifying for qualification, Spain won its group but in the home and home leg with Italy they lost meaning they were not one of the 8 teams to qualify for the Euro Under 21 championship and therefore couldn't be one of the best 4 teams there and therefore couldn't qualify for the Olympics. Got it!

More soccer. Here's an interesting tidbit...

In the semifinals in 1908, Denmark beat France. The French were so embarrassed with the defeat they declined to play for bronze. How bad did Denmark beat France? 17-1.

How do you score SEVENTEEN goals in a soccer game!?
Sophus Nielsen scored ten of those goals!

A UCLA Bruin, Dawn Harper, wins gold in the women's 100m hurdles.
A different American, Lolo Jones, had an enormous lead but tripped over the 9th (of 10) hurdles and settles for nothing.

As typical for NBC (or any American TV station) all they're talking about is Lolo Jones. Who cares!? She didn't win What about the winner? She's American, too even though she isn't the "star".

EDIT: Now that they interviewed both athletes, it's too bad what happened. Dawn Harper, who was expected to not be a factor and needed a miracle just to qualify is pretty arrogant and irritating. Lolo Jones was polite and had a pretty good attitude. And I'm not sure Dawn Harper counts as a Bruin - she doesn't go there and wikipedia says she majored in "Pre-Psychology". You can't major in that, you have to "major" in that before switching to Psychology which takes about a year or so.

In women's balance beam, Shawn Johnson finally gets a gold. American teammate Nastia Liukin settles for the silver.

Interesting facts catbox! Thanks for looking these up!

I heard discussions about taking soccer out of the olympic program. FIFA supports soccer at the olympic games only half-hearted. Nobody cares about being the winner of the olympic tournament anyway. This is no big deal. The IOC should think about replacing soccer with other sports i think.

Like BEISBOL!!! instead of getting rid of it!

I'm glad Roger Federer got his gold medal in the doubles. He seemed to be very very happy. It's not the single, but hey - hang it on the wall and nobody will see that.

laprimamirala wrote:

Like BEISBOL!!! instead of getting rid of it!

Baseball will not be part of it in London 2012. The IOC said that it's not popular in many countries. Which is true i guess.
So Beijing was the first and last time.
Same for softball by the way.

yup...saw that. Sad. Yet, where it has caught on, it has really caught on...

swiss_tiger wrote:

I'm glad Roger Federer got his gold medal in the doubles. He seemed to be very very happy. It's not the single, but hey - hang it on the wall and nobody will see that.

Rafael Nadal is ranked #1 in the world

laprimamirala wrote:

yup...saw that. Sad. Yet, where it has caught on, it has really caught on...

even in countries where nobody has a clue what baseball is.

catbox_9 wrote:

swiss_tiger wrote:

I'm glad Roger Federer got his gold medal in the doubles. He seemed to be very very happy. It's not the single, but hey - hang it on the wall and nobody will see that.

Rafael Nadal is ranked #1 in the world

Sad but true. Federer will fight back!

swiss_tiger wrote:

The IOC should think about replacing soccer with other sports i think.

Sports being considered for 2016 (up to 2 of these will be selected) Olympics are:
Golf, karate, softball, baseball, rugby, squash, and roller sports.

Of those, the only one I'd say worthy is golf. Don't they have enough fighting sports that all seem the same? They aren't going to bring back baseball since the best players don't play and they won't bring back softball because nobody but the USA really plays. Rugby seems like it's dominated by just a couple countries (maybe I'm wrong). I don't know anything about squash and roller sports sounds too much like the X-games. Then again, they have snowboarding and BMX so it wouldn't surprise me.

-------------------

The following non-Olympic sports are recognized by the Olympics. To be added to the Olympics a sport must first be recognized:
* Air sports
* Bandy
* Billiard sports
* Boules
* Bowling
* Bridge
* Chess
* Climbing
* Cricket
* DanceSport
* Golf
* Karate
* Korfball
* Lifesaving
* Motorcycle sport
* Netball
* Orienteering
* Pelote Basque
* Polo
* Powerboating
* Racquetball
* Roller sports
* Rugby
* Squash
* Sumo
* Surfing
* Tug of war
* Underwater sports
* Water skiing
* Wushu

How are bridge and chess sports?

GO US WOMEN'S VOLLEYBALL!!

Bridge and not poker?

laprimamirala wrote:

Bridge and not poker?

Too much gambling in poker I guess. Oh yeah...billiards?!?! Any "sport" where being 300 pounds overweight isn't a disadvantage isn't a sport.

What is Boules? And wushu?

they left out nose picking and....well, you know.

TG wrote:

What is Boules? And wushu?

Boules is a ball sport. Bocce ball is in the boules family.

Wushu is a form of Chinese martial arts.

That's a funny list of considered sports catbox. Some real strange stuff on it i think. Air sports? Hmm... like the Red Bull air race? Underwater sports? Never heard of a sport except scuba diving. But how can you have a competition in this?

I know two additional sports that have to go on this list (only existing in Switzerland):
Schwingen
Hornussen

Very traditional and very swiss!

That first sport doesn't sound too exciting - I don't care for combat sports. Wikipedia doesn't really explain hornussen, but it might be cool.

No baseball or softball in 2012


Looks like I might have to boycott watching the games again

In other news, Afghanistan wins its first-ever medal.

catbox_9 wrote:

In other news, Afghanistan wins its first-ever medal.

No Way!


In What?


Grenade Throwing?

gs78 wrote:

catbox_9 wrote:

In other news, Afghanistan wins its first-ever medal.

No Way!
In What?

Men's 58 kg. taekwondo.

So far Afghanistan, Bahrain, Tajikistan, and Togo have all won their first-ever medals.

Bahrain, Mongolia, and Panama all won gold medals for the first time. Mongolia previously held the record for most medals without a gold.

Did Easter Island win anything?

They don't compete. They don't have a national Olympic committee and their country has less than 4,000 people.