Why sport Down Under will rise to the top in 2018

I was fortunate to grow up during Australia’s golden age of sport, and throughout the late 1990s and early 2000s I watched some of Australia’s greatest ever athletes triumph on the course, field, pool, court and track.

I watched world records break, world champions crowned and medals and trophies presented to and lifted by men, women and teams that we now talk about as immortals, the greatest and the best ever.

I remember buying the old Wide World of Sports year in review paperback form the newsagent with all our triumphs.

I remember seeing Lleyton Hewitt and Pat Rafter battling it out for the world number one ranking and grand slams and Shane Warne alternating with Glenn McGrath with Adam Gilchrist behind the stumps, and if you got out Matthew Hayden you still had to get through Justin Langer or Ricky Ponting.

I remember the Australian women’s field hockey team reign supreme at number one from 1985 to 2000 as the number one nation.

Our rugby union boys held the trophy aloft in 1991 and 1999, and if it wasn’t for Johnny Wilkinson, you could have added 2003 to those years.

Our Olympic team was full of world champions, including Ian Thorpe, Susie O’Neill, Michael Diamond, Grant Hackett, Michael Klim, Natalie Cook and Kerri Pottharst, and who could forget Cathy Freeman in the 400 metres final?

Greg Norman was the only shark we wanted to see on TV.

(Kyodo)

But being so used to success, I really took it for granted and never appreciated how great we were until we hit a bit of a dry spell.

Take our Olympians, for instance. In 1988 we finished 15th overall, and we then managed to progress higher up the tally, with tenth in 1992, seventh in 1996 and fourth in our home Olympics in 2000 and also in 2004. Since then the trend has turned downwards, with sixth, eighth and tenth in our last three efforts.

Our cricketers are another prime example. From 2001 to 2003 the Australian men’s cricket team spent a huge 21 months on top of the Test rankings. Just before the Ashes we sat fifth. With that win we have managed to crawl back to a respectable third, but we’re still a fair way off our dominance of days past.

But I am not here to dwell on the past and start recounting yarns from ‘back in my day; I want to focus on our day, right here, right now, and what amazing sports people, sports teams and even sports animals we have.

With the Australia Day weekend just gone, let’s look at Australians around the sporting globe and what we currently have to be excited about.

Let’s start with Sam Kerr, our Young Australian of the Year winner, who made it to the final shortlist of ten players in the FIFA Best Women’s Player.

With so much grace on and off the field Kerr has helped catapult not only women’s football but women’s sport in general into the limelight.

(AP Photo/Gregory Bull).

Ben Simmonds is our next Australian sport golden boy, drawing comparisons to everyone and anyone at the same stage of their career. After two months he is already labelled as our best ever basketballer.

Still only young, Simmonds’s highlight reel rivals that of many others, and the fact that Philadelphia 76ers fans now get meat pies at home games is a sign of how popular the young Aussie is.

After beating Manny Pacquaio, Jeff Horn has launched himself onto the world boxing stage, and I’m looking forward to seeing how high the humble school teacher can soar.

Daniel Riccardo personifies the Aussie spirit. His cheeky smile, his never-say-die attitude and of course his shoeys are a shining endorsement for the country, and it won’t be long until Riccardo is pushing for his first F1 crown.

Ellyse Perry capped off 2017 as the ICC Women’s Cricketer of the Year and the number one player in all formats.

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Then there are the lesser known sports stars, like The Australian men’s and women’s coxless fours (rowing), Tyler Wright (surfing), Sally Pearson (hurdles), Britt Cox (mogul skiing), Jessica Fox (canoe), Emily Seebohm (swimming), Scotty James (snowboarding), Maddison Keeney (diving), Robbie Whittaker (UFC), who have us standing proud and cheering them on.

The most exciting part is there is a youngster out there perfecting their craft. We don’t know their name yet, but soon we’ll never be able to forget it.

A new year is a great opportunity to look back at what we’ve achieved and to look forward and what’s still to come and the ways sport will continue to bring our country together.