Australia sends smaller team to London Olympics

Australia is sending its smallest team to a summer Olympics since the 1992 Games, with 410 athletes set to compete in London with the goal of a top five finish on the medals table.

The team, finalised yesterday (Wednesday 11th July) and supported by 319 officials, is 25 members smaller than the party which won 14 gold, 15 silver and 17 bronze medals in Beijing to finish sixth.

It is comfortably bigger than the 290 who competed at the Barcelona Games 20 years ago when Australia last finished outside the top seven (in 10th place on the medal table).

The Australian Olympic Committee (AOC)'s target at the London 2012 Games is a tough task given host Britain will expect the medal boost that comes from home advantage and China, the United States and Russia are again likely to occupy the top three spots.

That is likely to leave the Australians battling it out with big-spending countries like France, Germany, Italy and Japan for the fifth spot.

The AOC's own benchmark projection in February last year predicted an eighth place finish in London but President John Coates has received better news with this year's analysis.

Speaking to reporters last week, Coates explained "I wasn't that confident last year when I saw the benchmark results coming in and saw that we'd dropped back from the 40 to 46 overall medals we'd need to be in the mix for the top five to 35.

"I've been pleased with what I've seen so far this year, particularly in sailing and in cycling and in rowing, and I'm aware that we'll get better results this year than we did last year in equestrian and shooting.

"The swimming results at the trials were better, albeit we're still going to be counting on some improvement on the times they were doing at our trials compared to the times the Americans are doing now to get up to 15 medals in the pool."

Coates sees swimming, always one of Australia's strengths and the sport in which Australia attained 20 medals in Beijing, as the key area in his team's bid to reach their medal target.

He his likely to have the satisfaction of watching James Magnussen bring the gold for the blue riband 100 metres freestyle sprint back to Australia for the first time since Michael Wenden in 1968.

Another key battleground is the velodrome where Anna Meares will be out to become the first female cyclist to win four Olympic track medals and the first to medal at three Games.

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