Who is the greatest sporting country?

Straya by a length. World Cups: Leaugue 10/13 Netball 11/15 Cricket 5/11 Union 2/8 (and we sorta don't really play it) Plenty more but you get my drift. The Master Race at anything we put out hand to with conviction.

lol This is not even a question, Serbia is by far the worlds best sporting nation. The ratio between the population and success in all sports is amazing, and there is no other country in the world even remotely close. Serbia were (and currently are) world champions in most if not all team sports which is unbelieveable. So No.1 is Serbia, then the laaarge gap, and then all others.

LoL that's easy... it's S E R B I A -> just 7mil people and dominate in most of worlds popular SPORTS S E R B I A the Greatest Sporting Nation

China's dominance and consistency in table tennis, badminton, diving, acrobatics and women's weightlifting together with excellence in shooting, judo, gymnastics, trampoline and speed skating is something few people know about. China has produced world beaters who are legends in their sports for utter consistency eg China's women table tennis has won all major table tennis tournaments for the last 50 years or so since its entry into sports bar twice to South Koreans. China has also dominated diving competitions consistently winning a majority of titles in every diving competition. In women's badminton doubles, they have produced two world beaters who have won all major titles and lost less than ten matches in their careers in Ge Fei-Gu Jun and Lin Ying-Wu Dixi. Chinese legends abound in table tennis and badminton but most of these legends are humble and prefer that their country be known for the glory and not the individual. There are few truly great Mount Everests in sports ie Don Bradman's 99.94 lifetime cricket batting average, Heather McKay's 16 consecutive British Open wins and only losing twice in her squash career, Jahangir Khan's 10 consecutive British Open wins and going almost 6 years unbeaten over 555 matches, Chinese women's dominance in table tennis winning all major tournaments except twice to Koreans, Ge Fei-Gu Jun and Lin Ying-Wu Dixi's badminton doubles career winning all and losing less than 10 matches in their careers, Mike Phelps and Mark Spitz's 9 and 8 gold medals and Usain Bolt 100 meters and 200 meters world records are some of the most superlative sporting records in history. and by the way, few also know that the Chinese are dominant in mathematics Olympiad. the Chinese do not trumpet their victories as much as others and much the better for that - we cannot stand big mouths.

india is definately showing its head up in boxing, wrestling ,archery, badminton,shooting we have always been good at chess hockey's past has been glorious n surely Virat n Dhoni are catching up fast with tendulkar but unfortunately most atheletes dont get any help from government but on a positive note we fast are creating healthy sporting culture n by 2020 we will be in top 20 :-)

9) 6 gold medals at the last Olympics 10) winners of all the major 3-day eventing events (Burley, Badminton, kentuckey) 11) Scott Dixon - Indy Car Champ 12) Lydia Ko - No 4 in the world in womens golf. 13) 3 Golds at world Kayaking champs 14) Americas Cup (don't want to talk about it) 15) Best Cricket Nation per Capita 16) Best field hockey nation per capita 17) World champion surf life saving team 18) Womens rugby 7, Rugby and League world champs (recently lost the league title)

If the measure of success was pound for pound sporting success, nobody can beat New Zealand. 1) Rugby World Champs 2) Rugby Sevens World Series Holders 3) 6 times world Softball Champs 4) Top 3 Rowing Nation 5) A top ranked track cycling nation 6) World champ Sailors in 3 classes (I think3, maybe 4) 7) 2nd at rugby league world cup 8) 2nd in the world in Netball I'll be back to list more

NZ if per capita IMO. We have a population of 4.6 mill ( or something like that) but are still going up against Aus, US and britain and winning some events. Now this is a pretty rough idea but times our population by 5 so its around Aussies pop then times our amount of medals by 5 aswell and NZ has 65 medals (we obvisley) wouldnt have that much but it would be a far greater amount of medals than Aus

RE: Johnno said | August 27th 2012 @ 10:18am Hingis is of Hungarian heritage(just like Monika Szeles). Her father's name is called Hingis Károly and they moved to Switzerland from Kassa(today called Kosice and belongs to Slovakia).

Well, if there was a worlds most competitive nation we're all here! GB, USA, Oz. Certainly talk the talk. We don't like losing, even on a worlds best sporting nation blog! Ok, so we (GB) lack in winter sports - not having mountains doesn't help but that aside you'll find us active in most sports. Extreme sports included, BMX etc. Our test will come in Rio to see if we can replicate success in London - Olympics truly must be the measure of sporting success

Czech republic per capita is the no1 tennis nation . Wow they have produced some stars such a talented group of people the czechs at sport, for there size, soccer and tennis, been ranked no2 before in soccer over the let 15 years manytimes some great players. But tennis wow do they have some stars especially the women -Women -Navratolva, Novotana, sUKOVA, Hanamanlikova, and now Petre Kitova who is amazing. -And for those that don't know Hingis is Chzech heritage. Both her parents are Chezch they moved to swiss when she was born. -SO in Hingis,navratolva and now Kitavova you have 3 of the most all time women players ever. -And in men's Lendl, the fabulously yet injury prone Miloslav richer, Peter Korda, and a few other so much talant in czech.

Tennis? Compare Russia's open era Tennis to Britain's and you'll notice that Russia has been way better. It's actually no contest there. I said that Rugby is obscure but present in Russia. If you're implying that Cricket is somehow the second most popular spectator sport in the world, I'd like to see a shred of proof. You can't use India as a boost for it's status. They may have a huge population, but they're still just one country out of over 200 in this big world. Judge it's merit on the amount of countries in which it is even slightly noticed (very few). Formula 1 is a waste of a type in your post. C'mon now.

Slightly odd response: I was basically agreeing with you- the fact I included three Ice-hockey players names as a great Russian achievement should have been a clue that I know Russia has achievements in Ice-Hockey :-) Still, with Russia you include sports which are 'obscure but present', but you dismiss the world's second most popular spectator sport on the grounds that Russia doesn't play it? I see you omit Tennis, Formula 1, Golf and Cycling as well. As I say, I don't really disagree with you on Russia's merits, but if you are trying to prove that Russia has a higher profile than Britain in globally popular international sports outside the Olympics, you need more than this.

Excluding the olympics what truly international sports are the US good at these days? Golf? Women's tennis? Track? The Aussies, despite their insecure whining, are a great sporting nation but only do well in a small number of sports. Great Britain in my opinion is the only country ' consistantly does well in truly global sports. Football (not great but ranked 4th) Cricket, Number 1 until 2 days ago. F1 two recent world champions and countless consructors, rugby world cup; rory in the golf, Murray in the top 3 or 4, dominant in track and road cycling, tour de france... For the most part the US do well in a small number of sports which are played by a small number of other countries.

uh uh. brit girls rip it up in the sack. Just sayin...

Agree, the olympic medal tally is a nice easy barometre to use but subsequently this won't include large number of elite athletes from non-oly sports. The US is a good example, where NFL, MLB and NBA attract the overwhelming majority of young potential athletes. Similar situations apply all around the globe. Scandanavian nations pump out professional drivers like a factory, how do we factor that sort of thing in? Professional athletes per capita maybe? Or is it more valid to count overall club-sport participation per capita?

As I've said, when you consider that there are completely different disciplines within "athletics", there are actually more than 30 sports at the games. "Outside of the Olympics, Britain has a better spread of sports than Russia" This isn't nearly true. In Britain, all they play are Football,Cricket, and Rugby(both variations). In Russia, they play Football, Basketball, Ice Hockey, Wrestling(Both variations), and even Rugby which is obscure but present. Russia (like most countries) isn't in the commonwealth so they don't have Cricket and therefore, it can't be considered in this comparison. Take notice of Britain not qualifying for many sports in the next Olympics. They don't get to do it automatically as the host country.

The obese 1 vs The Communists 0.

Russian competitors earned medals in 30 different sports? A magnificent achievement, considering there were only 26 sports in the Olympics. Is this like the time Evgeni Plushenko claimed to have won the first 'platinum' medal in the 2010 Winter Games? Just kidding: actually your point stands- Russia has a great spread of sports in the Olympics- much better than GB. I'd actually consider Russia more versatile than China as well, given China's laughable track and field record. Outside of the Olympics, Britain has a better spread of sports than Russia, but then again, Russia produced Pavel Datsyuk, Evgeni Malkin, and Alexander Ovechkin, and it's hard to top that.

Endorse your top ten. The last few olympics have clearly established the five most populous European countries and the five Pacific Rim countries as the summer games powerhouses. A little quibble re GB who you say are there "mainly due to their recent success in the past four years". Just wanted to point out:- 1/ Only country to win a gold medal at every games. 2/ More olympic medals than any country apart from the USA, former USSR and Germany/W Germany. 3/ Finished in the top ten of the medal table 17 times in 27 games including the last four games. 4/ Only finished lower than 13 in the medal table twice.