Peek into shameful SA at Games

2008-08-24 09:40

Johan van Wyk

Beijing - South African sporting authorities left Natalie du Toit in the lurch only hours before her historic Olympic debut.

Among other things, they allegedly:

- Refused to find her accommodation near her competition venue;

- Screamed at her and her coach when they asked the South African Sport Confederation and Olympic Committee (SASCOC) for the help of a translator;

- Forced her to wear a sponsor's shoes with uncomfortable heels even though she couldn't walk with them due to her disability.

These revelations come amid serious criticism of the poor performance by SA athletes in Beijing.

Going on for years

They are not the only evidence of the sporting authorities' hand in the fiasco. Swimmer Ryk Neethling said the tensions in the swimming team were so bad that the swimmers and their head coach almost got physical.

Rapport learnt that the accommodation that SASCOC found for Du Toit was so far from her competition venue that she would have had to get up at 04:00 to catch a bus at 05:00 so she could arrive at her destination at 06:00.

She was due to swim three hours later - not ideal preparation for an Olympic event, Rapport was told.

Du Toit herself found a hotel near the venue only 48 hours before the Olympic 10km open water swimming event - almost an hour's drive from Beijing. SASCOC bosses apparently also refused to help carry Du Toit's luggage to a taxi.

A source told Rapport, "It is absolutely scandalous that SASCOC did not lift a finger to make things easier for Natalie. Heavens above, she has enough obstacles."

"She is one of the Games' darlings due to her incredible guts, but her own people snub her."

Meanwhile, swimming star Ryk Neethling told how he had to break up a fight between the SA swimming captain Gerhard Zandberg and Roland Schoeman about comments that Zandberg had made. After Neethling tried to make peace, he feared that Swimming SA's head coach Dirk Lange would hit him.

Neethling said he could no longer face swimming for SA because of the tense atmosphere, which has been evident for years. He said either Lange should leave or he would.

"It reached an absolute low point at the Olympic training camp in South Korea before the Games. It was so bad that Lange and I did not speak a single word to one another here at the Games."

- Rapport