The_Brown_Hornet
John Eales (66)
Being a World Champion is not mediocre. Neither is 17 individual National Championships.
How would you rate Thorpe's relay medals, as they amount to 4 of his 9 olympic tally.
Not as much as his five individual medals. Ian Thorpe's a champion and has done it all on the big stage multiple times. The comparison is not even close with his achievements in his chosen sport and nearly any of our current crop of athletics competitors.
Manou is an athlete who has promised a lot during her career, like a lot of Australian T&F athletes. Apart from one performance in 2008, she has singularly failed to deliver over the course of her long career. John Steffensen won the Commonwealth Gold in the 400m in 2006 and was expected to kick on. He didn't. This is what I'm talking about. In athletics in the last 20+ years we have a history of trotting out athletes who talk a big game and don't back it up. Many times I've seen these guys rock up to a major championship and not even get close to their PB. I think could be forgiven for being a bit disappointed about that. Then there's the drama that seems to surround them, the infighting and all that crap. As a person with a love of athletics, I find it disheartening.