Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
Incredible comeback for Stefan
STEFAN OKUNBOR is in line to make his return to action in Australia after healing “like a terminator” from a ruptured Achilles tendon.
The former Kerry All-ireland winner suffered the serious injury in January, having made a quick impression with AFL side Geelong but appears to have retained all his athleticism.
Cats head coach Chris Scott has been taking note, with the Tralee man touted to join Kingdom compatriot Mark O’connor and Zach Tuohy in the senior ranks before the season is out, and an outing in the reserves is imminent.
“He’s certainly trained well enough to play,” Scott said. “My observation of him at training over a long period of time is that he’s looked ready to me.
“He’s healed like a terminator. It’s been a remarkable recovery and the way he’s trained has been pretty impressive as well.”
Meanwhile, it is being reported that Aisling Mccarthy could be the first Irish player to switch clubs since Cora Staunton began the female version of the so-called ‘Irish Experiment’ in 2018.
Mccarthy joined then AFLW champions Western Bulldogs for the following year and has progressed since making her debut in round 2 of the 2019 season.
The Tipperary star is being linked with a move from Melbourne to Perth, with West Coast Eagles pushing for her services.
The news is not so positive for Joanne Doonan however, with Carlton confirming that they will not be offering the Fermanagh player a contract for the 2021 campaign.
FORTY years ago athletics was top of the pops in Britain – and Seb Coe and Steve Ovett vied for number one.
At the Moscow Olympics they held the sporting world spellbound in a golden era for the sport.
And whenever Coe and Ovett raced together – and they did only seven times in 17 years – prime time television schedules were cleared.
To this day their rivalry fascinates the nation, even if Lord Coe, now the President of World Athetlics, believes it owed a fair bit to good fortune as “our other national games were not really very good products”.
He said: “Cricket was very in and out, England rugby was not something you’d make a beeline to Twickenham to watch, and in football, we’d failed to qualify for the last two World Cups.
“There was suddenly a realisation that British athletics had the best of the best anywhere in the world. No other sport could point to that.”
To fully understand what played out across an astonishing time in Russia, you need to go back to Christmas Day the previous year.
While the country reached for turkey and trimmings, Coe set off from the Peak District into Sheffield on a 13-mile uphill run with Peter, his father and coach, following behind in his car.
“I got back and had my lunch and as I sat down preparing for the 800th screening of Dambusters, I remember feeling vaguely uneasy,” said Coe.
“I knew suddenly what it was. I thought, ‘I bet he’s out training again’. So compulsively I went upstairs, put my kit back on and ran another five miles.”
Not until 2006, when the pair bumped into each other at the Commonwealth
OLYMPIC MEDAL HAUL Gold Gold Silver Silver OLYMPIC MEDAL HAUL Gold Bronze
Games in Melbourne, did Coe finally come clean to Ovett.
“And do you know what he said?” recalled Coe with an incredulous air. “He said, ‘Did you only go out twice that day?!’
“Twenty seven years on and we’re still in the mindset where we couldn’t let it rest at that – he had to have the last word.
“I still don’t know whether he actually did go out three times but...” Against that backdrop, it’s easy to understand the circus that surrounded their epic middle-distance duels in Moscow.
“We were two people from the same country at the same time chasing the same spoils,” said Coe.
“Both knowing that in order to come home with something we would have to demolish 10 years of hard, unremitting slog in each other’s lives.”
Coe had set three world records the previous summer, while Ovett flew to the Russian capital unbeaten at 1500m in more than three years.
When he then beat Coe into second place over 800m, it not only confirmed him as the hottest of favourites for the longer trip, it left the future Lord shattered.
“The following morning I was buried in bed, I didn’t want to get up,” said Coe. “The only thing that drove me on was never, ever wanting to feel like that again.”
He felt he had never run a worse race and was so appalled with himself that come the 1500m – “I was prepared to die with blood in my boots in the stadium.”
So followed one of the great sporting comebacks.
Two slow laps might have played into the hands of the 800m specialist, but he still had to execute.
Forty years on Seb Coe remains oh so relieved that he did.