Nigeria’s biggest hope for a medal at the Paris Olympics Tobi Amusan crashed out of the Women’s 100m Hurdles, Friday morning to the disappointment of athletics watchers world wide.
Amusan who is the reigning world champion and world record holder in the 110m hurdles, suffered a shock exit from the Paris 2024 Olympics.
The 27-year-old Nigerian superstar, who had been tipped as one of the biggest medal hopes for her country, failed to even reach the final after finishing third in her semi-final heat with a time of 12.55 seconds, which was not good enough for her to progress. She had to wait for the conclusion of the other semi-final heats to know her fate.
She was lucky after Heat 2 as the third placed runner, Charisma Taylor clocked 12. 63 seconds. But the Heat 3 sealed Amusan’s fate. Both the third and fourth runners had better time than hers.
Jamaica’s Ackera Nugent clocked 12.44 seconds while Cyrena Samba-Mayela of France who placed fourth returned after 12.52 seconds to better Amusan’s time.
Amusan, who successfully appealed against a doping ban earlier this year after she was accused of missing three doping tests, did not speak after her elimination.
With this latest development, Nigeria’s chances of winning a medal at the Olympics have become slimmer.
Before the commencement of the 2024 Paris Olympics, Nigeria’s Minister of Sports Development Senator John Owan Enoh promised to lead Team Nigeria to her best outing in the history of Nigeria’s participation in the Olympics.
So far, after 14 days of intensive competition in various sports, Nigeria is yet to appear in the medal table.
It started with the early exit of Quadri Aruna in table tennis, Offiong Edem followed suit in the women’s singles. Then the crash of Team Nigeria captain, Opeyori in badminton. It was the same story for the likes of Blessing Oborududu and Odunayo Adekuoroye.
The Nigerian men’s and women’s 4x100m quartet followed in the same manner.
Nigeria’s sole representative in the men’s 400m final at Paris 2024 Samuel Ogazi gave a good account of himself in his maiden Olympics but not good enough to earn himself and country a medal after finishing seventh.
Although winning a medal is the ultimate goal, Nigeria produced one of the most defining moments in Olympic basketball history when D’Tigress shredded every pre-tournament prediction and expectation to make it to the Quarter-Finals for the first time.
The size of their accomplishment is truly epic, off the charts and really is one of the all-time fairytale stories.
No men’s team has previously qualified for the last eight. Coming into this edition, African women’s teams were 1-37 in the Games. It is only within this context that one steps back and truly frame the enormity of what has just happened.
Vanguard News
