Polarising swimmer Nick D’Arcy flopped instead of flying as other Australians endured a farcical opening to competition at the Delhi Commonwealth Games.
While rising star Emily Seebohm opened her punishing pool campaign in style, D’Arcy was inconsolable after his dream of sporting redemption sank.
He was at a loss to explain failing to qualify for a 200m butterfly final he was expected to win.
His confusion was matched by Australia’s boxers at a nonsensical weigh-in, while the nation’s gold seeking netballers lodged more goals than the number of spectators who watched them trump Samoa.
D’Arcy, dumped from the 2008 Beijing Olympics and last year’s world titles after his brutal assault on former team member Simon Cowley, could finish only ninth fastest in the 200m `fly heats.
“I came here hoping I could win gold for my country and that dream has been cut short,” D’Arcy said.
“It has been a big couple of years so to get cut down so early is pretty disappointing.”
In contrast, 18-year-old Seebohm, who could win eight medals in Delhi, cruised into Monday night’s final of the 200m individual medley – despite a technical error briefly listing her as disqualified.
Compatriot Alicia Coutts was fastest qualifier for the same final, while Ryan Napoleon, who missed a chunk of training due to a doping ban for using wrongly labelled asthma medication, was the quickest qualifier for Monday night’s 400m freestyle final.
Australian duo Kylie Palmer and Blair Evans topped qualifying for the 200m women’s freestyle final and Australia’s 4x100m freestyle relay team also topped the heats – finals of both those events will also be staged Monday night.
The evening swim finals offer five of the eight gold medals on Monday, the others in the men’s team gymnastics and two at the weightlifting.
But the first day of competition began in ludicrous fashion which mirrored shambolic preparations for the most expensive Games ever held.
Australian boxers were weighed on scales which issued readings 1.4kg heavier than reality – many headed for saunas or runs around the athletes village to shed surplus weight they never had.
“I thought last year when I witnessed a bloke in Victoria win a fight with one arm I had seen it all, but this even tops that,” Australia’s assistant boxing coach Don Abnett said after the weigh-in was abandoned and rescheduled for Tuesday.
Australia’s netballers thrashed world No.9 Samoa 76-39 before just 58 legitimate spectators.
“Netball is not that huge in India so I can’t imagine the crowd improving much, but we don’t care,” shooter Cath Cox said.
“If we win a gold medal in front of a man and a dog, that’s fine with me.”
Ghost town crowds were also at other venues as thousands of spectator seats remained vacant.
Gary Russell-Sharam
Guest
A lot has been written about Darcy in the last few months and his struggle to get back in the team etc. However he committed a bad assault on another competitor that seems to have been given far less press than Darcy's road to the commenwealth games. I do not have much sympathy for Darcy if any!!! I do have a lot of sypathy for his victim in the assault. Reading recently before the CG event in a weekend newspaper there was a story of Darcy's hell at having to fight back to get recognised after his misdomeaner and his new girl friend stating that he is not a thug. Well ask Simon Cowley about that. It would seem that this young man (Darcy) is now realising that a toll has to be paid for bad actions and some might say that his banning from the Olypics and WCh might be the extent of the price to be paid others might not agree. To break someones face like he did suggests that this young man needs anger management courses and a realisation that some responsibility should be taken for his actions by Darcy himself. Maybe a higher power is meeting out the justice that some would think appropriate for his actions.
jameswm
Guest
Dare I say it - is that karma for D'Arcy?