Australia has lost further ground on the 2011 Benchmark Medal Table, slipping to ninth place behind Italy.

The Italians climbed above us on the projected 2012 Olympic medal tally by winning a staggering eleven medals at the World Fencing Championships- four gold, three silver and four bronze medals compared to Australia’s empty swag.

Italy now sits eighth on the Benchmark table with 31 medals compared to our 30.

Australia’s best chance of making up some lost ground depends on the World Sailing Championships to be held in Perth in December where we could win as many as five medals.

The President of the Australian Olympic Committee (AOC) John Coates recently described our medal decline as a “worrying trend”.

He is particularly concerned about the sharp drop-off in the number of sports where Australia is winning medals.

So far this year Australia has only won medals in seven sports compared to medal success in twenty sports at the Sydney 2000 Olympics.

Coates knows we must have a “wider spread” of medal success to achieve our aim of finishing in the top five nations on the overall medal tally at the 2012 Olympic Games in London.

Australia finished fourth on the overall medal tally in 2000 with 58 medals, fourth in Athens in 2004 with 49 medals and fifth overall in Beijing in 2008 with 46 medals.

Coates has not given up hope of a sharp turnaround in London. “There is a ray of hope for London,” he said. “We’ve had 37 fourth and fifth places this year and we need to convert them into medals.”

He has high hopes for Lauren Mitchell in gymnastics, women’s and men’s basketball and women’s water polo in London next year. Our cycling team has made a remarkable recovery after only one medal in Beijing they are now dominating in road and track and Australia’s clash with Team GB in cycling will be one of the highlights of the London Games.

At a recent forum with the head coaches of the different sports in Adelaide it was obvious the cycling team is well advanced in planning and preparation for London and is confident of success.

Coates has acknowledged that the sports received a significant increase in funding from the Federal Government last year but has realised “it was not enough”.

He called on the Australian Sports Commission (ASC) to seek more funding from the Government.

“I would hope the ASC will take the fight up to the Government for more funding and not leave it to the AOC to put its head up again “he told the recent National Elite Sport Council (NESC) conference in Canberra.

The AOC does not rely on government funding but campaigned on behalf of its member sports for more government funding post the Crawford Report in 2009 and 2010.

Coates said the lack of funding had impacted on sports institutes and academies across the country.
“Institutes have been forced to cull some sports because of a lack of funding,” Coates said.

He strongly defended the emphasis placed on winning medals at the Olympics.

“Australia should aspire to excellence in sport,” he said. “If we didn’t aspire to excellence the government would not have set up the CSIRO. The Australian people take great pride in our performances and our athletes are great role models.”

He said that history shows that extra funding results in outstanding results.

“The bottom line is the resources you throw at your sports,” Coates said. “This result is a wakeup call for government and sport.”

Mike Tancred
AOC