Rough going for J'cans

Elton Tucker, Assistant Sport Editor

ATHENS:

BADMINTON PLAYER Nigella Saunders was eliminated and shooter Dawn Kobayashi found the going rough and finished well down the field as Jamaica bowed into competition early on Day Two of the 2004 Olympics in Athens.

Saunders was outclassed 11-4, 11-1 by No. 4 seed Mia Audina of the Netherlands in the opening round of the women's singles in just 16 minutes.

Kobayashi was joint 41st of 44 shooters in the 10m Air Rifle event.

Audina, a silver medallist from the 1996 Games in Atlanta, was just too good for Jamaica's top female player.

BLEW AWAY HER OPPONENT

Saunders, 24, proved competitive in the opening set and even led 3-2 but when the going got tough her opponent produced too many weapons. The 25-year-old Indonesian-born Dutchwoman simply blew away her opponent in the second set racing to a 10-0 lead before cruising to victory in five minutes.

Saunders had mixed feelings after her defeat.

"I am very disappointed but it's my first Olympics and I was plying the number four seed. I am just ranked 34 in the world so I knew it was going to be a pretty tough game."

Canada-based shooter Koyabashi who is also in her first Games had four fairly good rounds of 98, 93, 97 and 95 (all out of 100) but this still put her 16 points off the leader after the qualification round which was led by Russia's Lioubov Galkina with 399 (99, 100, 100, 100).

The gold medal eventually went to China's Li Du with 502.0 points after the final round. Galkina took silver with 501.5 and Czech Katerina Kurkova bronze with 501.1.