My mate no longer supports Team GB

There was an African bloke on the facebook football page telling the brits to thank them for their great teams

He was slaughtered of course, but is he wrong? I wouldn't say so

Trevor Noah (comedian) was bashed for saying the French team was mainly Africans, but he was pretty much spot on

Belgium and France (especially) are other countries that are reliant on their colonial past.

Steve, do you think that you may be able to talk some sense in to your mate?

It’s hard to pick out detail from the grainy footage, but it’s clear from the commentary that something odd has just happened at the 2009 English Schools’ championships. How on earth have Kent managed to storm into the lead in the 4x100m relay? Were there some irregularities in the baton handover? “I haven’t seen any red flags go up yet,” the commentator says, sceptically. For anyone watching 10 years later, the answer is obvious: the replay shows the first Kent runner handing the baton to a 13-year-old Dina Asher-Smith.

The footage, uploaded to YouTube by her mother Julie, is probably Asher-Smith’s first TV appearance. She hares down the back straight and gives the baton to her teammate Sophie Ayre, who rounds the final bend in first place. “We immediately had her on second leg as it’s the longest,” Ayre said. “She was so easy to work with in a team and we all had fun practising. I was on third leg so she passed me the baton and we always had a really good change.”

The 23-year-old ran the same leg for Great Britain’s 4x100m team at the IAAF world championships in Doha on Saturday. They held off the USA to finish second: a silver medal to add to her 200m gold and 100m silver, both new British records, and all accomplished with her trademark beaming smile.

World domination beckons. Asher-Smith has a first-class degree in history from King’s College London. Vogue and Elle have feted her, as have Stormzy and Dave, the rapper who won the Mercury prize last month. Last year she and her fellow gold medallist Katarina Johnson-Thompson, who won the heptathlon on Friday, modelled on the catwalk at Paris fashion week.

The two women may just be the stars that British athletics needs to nudge people back on to the track. While football, cricket and swimming have all seen falling levels of participation at grassroots, running had seemed to be the one sport that was bucking the trend, with nearly 7 million people running regularly.

The growth of parkrun and health drives through programmes such as Couch to 5k have led to more street runners, particularly women. Yet the number of people doing regular track and field events such as sprinting, high jump and javelin has been falling. In November 2016 Sport England’s Active Lives Survey recorded 249,000 people taking part regularly in track and field activities. By November 2018 that figure had fallen to 197,000.

Asher-Smith is now focusing on an Olympic gold medal – or two, maybe even three – in Tokyo next year and Ayre can imagine how her competitors feel. In the junior girls’ category she ran for Medway and Maidstone, rivals to Asher-Smith’s club, Blackheath and Bromley Harriers, and she got used to watching the younger girl’s back disappear into the distance.

“Whenever anyone saw they were in a heat with Dina they knew it was bad news,” Ayre said. “She has always been amazing and I know my dad had said from the get-go she’s going to be incredible.

“She was always so modest and one of the nicest people I ever met on the track.”

Modest, humble, kind, enthusiastic and bright are words that crop up time and again when people describe Asher-Smith, from coaches and teachers to classmates and competitors.

Dina – short for Geraldina – was born and grew up in Orpington, one of those suburbs on the fringes of south-east London where there seems to be a park around every corner. Her family home is in one of the many streets around Poverest Park which backs on to Perry Hall primary school, the two places that cemented Asher-Smith’s early love of her sport.

“She would have been seven,” said Teri Carty, who ran Perry Hall’s running club every Monday lunchtime. “To start with I was running with her. And then she would just overtake me. But I did keep plodding through. She would have a big smile on her face as she ran past me again. It wasn’t a belittling smile, it meant ‘you’ve given me this opportunity and I’m using it’.”

High-place finishes at inter-school cross-country competitions swiftly brought her to the attention of Blackheath and Bromley Harriers.

“She did three of those, and I always remember the last one,” Carty said. “She said: ‘I’ve had enough of this.’ She was fed up being cold and wet. She always did amazingly well. And that’s when she turned it round and decided she wanted to do shorter distances.”

By this time Asher-Smith had started going to Perry Hall’s summer athletics club, doing javelin and sprinting and other track and field sports. “My lasting memory of her was the way she bounced over some little hurdles that we set up as a warm-up,” said teacher Jonathan Hewitt. “All the other kids just plodded over them. She was like a gazelle, as though she had springs on her feet.”

By the time Asher-Smith went on to secondary school, sprinting had become a serious pursuit and she started to be selected for competitions around the country: county events, then national championships for Kent, then the Commonwealth Youth Games.

“I still smile at the fact that her mum was very, very concerned that it might interrupt her learning,” Carty said. “And I think that gave Dina that push to think I must show Mum or Dad that I can do both.”

She could: at Newstead Wood school – a selective girls’ grammar in Orpington – Asher-Smith achieved a remarkable 10 A* GCSEs, then three As at A-level. In 2015, the year after she won the 100m at the World Junior Championships and after a summer in which she had set a British record in the 200m at her first world championships, in Beijing, she began reading history at King’s College London. By the time she graduated with a first, she had an Olympic bronze medal.

“To be able to do what she’s done academically as well as the commitment that she’s had to give to be where she is in sport, you know, that’s amazing,” said Perry Hall’s headteacher, Lorraine Richards.

Last year, after a clean sweep at the European championships with golds in the 100m, 200m and 4x100m relay, Asher-Smith began to show the rest of the world that she is not only an athlete. She appeared on the cover of Elle magazine and featured with several other significant figures in the video for south London rapper Dave’s single Black. She appeared on the Jonathan Ross Show and bantered with Ross and the other guests without a stumble.

“You don’t get invited on chatshows unless you’re good – you’ve got to be entertaining and you’ve got to be able to tell a story that is going to be amusing,” said Nigel Currie, a sports marketing expert. “And she’s got all that.”

Currie says Asher-Smith’s choice to become a sprinter is what makes her so marketable. “Sprinting is the blue ribbon event. There’s lots of events and lots of opportunities to break world records or be the fastest woman in the world,” he said. “She’s burst on to the scene at exactly the right time, a year before the Olympics. She’s probably got the potential to become the highest-paid female athlete we’ve ever had.”

Children and staff at Perry Hall school are also looking forward to the Olympics, where there are signs that Asher-Smith really might prompt a boom in track and field participation. Louise Davison, who was in the year above Asher-Smith and ran 800m for Blackheath and Bromley Harriers, is now a teacher at the school and has taken over the running club. “I have had 15 children come to me today and say ‘Can I have a running club letter, can I have a running club letter?’” she said. “They’re now really enthusiastic about joining, knowing that was where Dina started.”

The headteacher agrees. “Last time she came here, she brought her medals,” Richards said. “I think she was really overwhelmed with how excited the children were to see her.”

For all her achievements so far, her teachers still recognise the little girl who first started at their school. “She’s no different,” Carty said. “I’ve seen her since she was four and a half. And I see her now on TV and she’s just a taller four-and-a-half- year-old, if that makes sense. She’s not changed at all.”

Of course, prejudice is such a negative and potentially destructive emotion.

Prejudice is an affective feeling towards a person based on that person's perceived group membership. The word is often used to refer to a preconceived, usually unfavourable, evaluation of another person based on that person's political affiliation, sex, gender, beliefs, values, social class, age, disability, religion, sexuality, race/ethnicity, language, nationality, beauty, occupation, education, criminality, sport team affiliation or other personal characteristics.

Good to know that it doesn't raise its ugly head on this forum.

We've always had the odd imported talent but nowadays its gone way beyond that

Joffrey Archer for example, wasn't eligible until 2021? but was fast tracked

Stolen talent isn't the best way to win, it makes us cheats really

Angoose 05 Oct 19 22:06 Joined: 18 Jul 02 | Topic/replies: 8,075 | Blogger: Angoose's blog
Of course, prejudice is such a negative and potentially destructive emotion.

Prejudice is an affective feeling towards a person based on that person's perceived group membership. The word is often used to refer to a preconceived, usually unfavourable, evaluation of another person based on that person's political affiliation, sex, gender, beliefs, values, social class, age, disability, religion, sexuality, race/ethnicity, language, nationality, beauty, occupation, education, criminality, sport team affiliation or other personal characteristics.

Good to know that it doesn't raise its ugly head on this forum. Happy

What on earth are you talking about? I’m 99% sure my mate feels the way he does because of the political situation in this country at the moment. I’ll catch up with him later today and try and find out more.
Why do people like you constantly feel the need to create a ‘them and us’ situation. You seem to be looking for trouble no matter what. Does trouble/conflict excite you?

I think the Archer one is probably pretty significant for the WestIndies,i.e. will we ever see a dominant West Indies cricket team again?
Ok its been quite a while since they were strong in the 5 day test match format but surely others will follow Archer as should imagine the commercial and financial opportunities are far greater over here?

Angoose thanks for posting 05 Oct 19 22:02.

Really enjoyed reading that.

Angoose 06 Oct 19 11:18 Joined: 18 Jul 02 | Topic/replies: 8,109 | Blogger: Angoose's blog
My pleasure, it is a very good article that deserves to be read.


Your post has no relevance. Mate never mentioned anything regarding prejudice as to why he no longer supports Team GB or the England football team.
Angoose you seem to be stirring trouble for no apparent reason except your own personal pleasure!

Good Lord, they'll be accusing me of racism next!

Do you support the German Monarchy lybertyne?

Yes we know all that Whisper, but what's your point?

Salazaar is just another fall guy. fine him and ban him from the sport for life, just to be seen like they are doing something

I think we know that achieves fack all, the next patsy will be brought in and then outed when he/she needs to be

A joke of a system. The system has to protect itself, the human is collateral damage.

Cheats come and go but the system set up for profit remains no matter what

We live in a world where you're no more than 12 hours away from any other person or country on the planet, where families relocate every day and tragically, diaspora is a geo-political fact.

Given this, it's prestty nonsensical to expect or desire a British / English / National team to be made up of folks who can trace their bloodline back to the Anglo Saxons.

If any representitive is proud to pull on my national shirt and gives it their all, then I'm supporing them, irrespective of the colour of their skin and where they were born.

Anybody born here is British...that is the law

Whether they are white, black, brown or bright purple.



We could further define people into White British, Black British, Asian British or Euro British, etc

But they would all be BRITISH

When I suggested my further definitions to somebody he said I was racist

So I am afraid we are all British...we cannot get round it.

If I was a billionaire athletic type sports team owner my team would be solely of people with African descent you'd be foolish to have a team of pasteys aint got the genes unfortunately.

Simples really......you can only represent the country you are born in.Full stop.Nothing racist can then occur afterwards.Born in Britain you are British and same for every country across the globe.