Bad sportspersonship

As most if not all of you know from my Paralympic thread in the General Discussion section, I have put on a link to the BBC coverage of the games.

Well 9 am in China, the USA wheelchair basketball team were going to play Iran int he quarter finals, however they won 20 - 0 in a second and are through to play in the semi-final.

Now, I know what you think, how on earth did the US team won 20 - 0 in a second? Well here what appears happened......

In yesterdays quarter final, Israel beat Canads (sorry to our Canadain friends) and are through tot he semi finals. Now IF Iran beat the US in this mornings quarter final, then they would have played Israel.....However, they never turned up and so when the match finally started, the US won 20 - 0 automatically and are through automatically to the semi final agaisnt Israel.

Now, here's where it gets a tiny bit sticky, when the IPC wheelchair basketball officals spoke to the Iranians, they were told that Iran withdrew not because they didn't want to play Israel as they don't recognise the country but because of the scheduling. They also said that they wanted or thought that they wanted/were playing at 11.15 and therefore never went tot he 9 am one.

This is very sad as the other countries that lost out all thre way tot he beginning of the matches leading to the Paralympics and during the matches during the Paralympics are losing out the chance to get a medal.

Anyway that's my rant and I just think the excuse is very weak and there could be trouble in the future and it just a very bad sportspersonship for people to do this for an extrememly feeble excuse.

__________________
Eagle in Residence
Tempory Frisker

Well now it seems that several IPC (International Paralympic Committee) officals aren't doing a good job. Last week, there was a terribal crash during a wheelchair race and after a complaint (forgotten who) from somebody, they had to re-run the race on Friday and everybody had to gand back their medals.

NOW, a similar thing happened again. During the final of another wheelchair race, GB's hopeful David Weir finally won his first gold medal, the Aussie's complained, saying that their man was in the wrong lane (and coming second).

NOW, they complained AFTER the race and the officals are saying the race has to re-run on Tuesday or Wednesday.

I think I am starting to be pissed off about all of these incompentent officals and bad sportspersonship.

__________________
Eagle in Residence
Tempory Frisker

Who knows. All I know is that the Irainian officals are saying that it was all about the schedule and they thought they should play at 11.15 am and not 9 am.

As you said, the excuse is a bit fishy and probably smells like a fish as well.

__________________
Eagle in Residence
Tempory Frisker

I just heard this morning that the Aussie team withdrawn their protest and therefore the race won't be re-run and David Weir, the Aussie athlete who came 2nd and the other athlete (didn't bother seeing who it was, sorry) will ge their medals later.

It seems that it was the team and not the athlete, a certain Mr Finley who made the protest straight after the race, where there were 2 lists of the lineup of the race and the athletes were put in another starting lineup different to the 2 lists. However, it wasn't Mr Finley who complaint and as soon as he heard about the protest, he convinced the head coach that he wanted the complaint withdrawn.

This is the 2nd bit of trouble that happened in the wheelchair racing, as earlier this week, there was a crash in a women's final race, but there was complaints from the Swiss and 2 other countries because if there wasn't the crash, then the result would be different.

So that race was re-run but with 7 people instead of the usual 8 as the Swiss athlete who caused the crash had a broken collarbone and therefore disqualified. All I know is that the GB athlete who came 2nd original came 3rd the second time around but she didn't cacre as long as she won a medal.

NOW, that's what I call a good sportspersonship.

__________________
Eagle in Residence
Tempory Frisker

I have never heard so many incidents at the Paralympics before though in saying that, the BBC's coverage wasn't so much or even live.

Apparently a GB athlete who was classified once, was given another classification by the IPC (International Paralympic Committee), (classification is used for disabled people, the lover classification the more severe disability, while the higher one is for people with less severe disabilities and therefore to make sure, not always, the events are fair), and she came a shot put event and came in second in a discus event.

But it seems that the Paralympic people who are involved with choosing whatever the classifications for the athletes, decided that, with the discus event, the teenager shouldn't have been in that event and took her medal away. And it seems that now, she's been told, that she can't compete in any Paralympics again, as she's not disabled enough.

And when she thought at the time she won the silver medal and tried to shake hands with an Aussie (No offence to our Aussie friends in here) athlete, she was shunned and when it was her turn in the event, there were chants of Cheat from people.

Sorry about these little rants, but this Paralympics to me seem like a (excuse the pun) runnying joke and as a disabled person who has done a bit of Judo and Karate competitions in the past, I find that certain people just don't have the mental capacity for good sportpersonship.

__________________
Eagle in Residence
Tempory Frisker

Shakes head in amazement. "You may have heard stories about disabled people being discriminated because of their disability but I have just read an article about an Aussie athlete who was discrinminated because she could she better than the classification allowed her to be.

Confused? So am I. But it does seem that although she's partially sighted, she has more sighted in one eye than the Paralympics allow.

So, now the thing is that able bodied (I hate that term) people or rather disabled people who are more able bodied than the Paralympians are being discriminated.

I am still amazed and can't thing of any words except for amazed to describe how I feel now."

__________________
Eagle in Residence
Tempory Frisker

Bet you were glad when you were going downhill.

__________________
Eagle in Residence
Tempory Frisker