Hungarian Sport in the Mirror of the 2000 Olympic Games
Hungarian Sport in the Mirror of the 2000 Olympic Games
Although volumes of professional articles and inspired studies had been written about the drawbacks and adverse effects of the exaggerated Olympic frenzy surrounding Hungarian sport, it is still fact that, every four years the young and the old alike hold their breath nailed to the screen as the watch the Hungarian Olympic team, catch up with the events, give everything they can to support our girls and boys, cheer for the victories, and feel lousy about the defeats.
The overall assessment of sports as a whole thus depends almost entirely on the good or poor performance of our team at the Olympic Games. No matter how good the work of the state and/or social sport management circles is, public opinion pigeonholes the whole year of Hungarian sport as ‘good’ or ‘bad’, ‘outstanding’ or ‘atrocious’ in its entirety, mainly on the basis of Olympic medals - gold in particular.
This phenomenon is not necessarily to be applauded, but it exists all the same. Therefore, a more detailed analysis of the Hungarian participation at the 17th summer Olympic Games seems to be inevitable.
At first glance, the picture is actually quite appealing: our Olympic delegation brought home 17 medals altogether; and 8 times out of this 17, a representative of Hungary was called to step on the highest grade of the podium. Regarding the non-official - but nevertheless widely used, referenced and acclaimed - ranking based on medals, the Hungarian team took 13th place among the 199 nations participating in the Games. Even if we look at the absolute number of medals – an indicator quite fashionable in the English-speaking countries – only Japan and the Ukraine prevail over us, with fewer gold medals but a more silvers and bronzes.
However, if we examine the above data broken down by individual disciplines, there seem to be far fewer reasons for enthusiasm. Seven out of the 17 medals (41.18%), four of the eight gold medals (50%) were won by the kayak-canoe section, putting them into a definite victory position on the medal table for their sport, and improving the really rather mediocre overall Hungarian qualification from grade C to B.
Sure, there are at least two ways to interpret this argument. The negative attitude: the smashing victory of the canoeists stretches some sort of protective screen to shield the other sportsmen and with women performing not too well or even poorly. The positive attitude: in fact, it demonstrates the strength of Hungarian sport that at every successful Olympics, there is a ‘dynamo’ branch in which the competitors really get a grip on competition, give their best, and actually perform better than expected. The roles are always switched, but there always is such a prominent sport or game. To quote a few historic examples: swimming in 1952, gymnastics in 1956, fencing in 1964, swimming again in 1992, etc. (Now, one can pick the explanation that better suits their personal taste…)
With regard to the first argument, the following data seems to be relevant: 17 medals were won by our champions in 11 disciplines (wrestling, kayak-canoe, handball, boxing, pentathlon, rifle-shooting, weightlifting, gymnastics, swimming, fencing, and water polo), while in the other 12 or 13 (depending whether or not windsurfing and sailing are counted separately) branches, we had no medals at all. If we add that there were sports, which brought us no medals but still afforded qualification points for the 4th to 6th places (table tennis, cycling, taek-won-do), we observe that there are 9 (10) disciplines - more than 1/3 of the total - left that eventually failed to add a single Olympic point to the results of the Hungarian team. If, in addition, we remark that due to the specifics of the pre-qualification system our team did not even make it to the Games in the popular team sports practiced world-wide (basketball, volleyball, men’s handball, soccer, field hockey - less cultivated but with long-standing traditions -, baseball and perhaps the odd-one-out, softball), the picture we painted on the basis of individual disciplines is not only somber, but rather bleak indeed.
On the other hand, positive thinkers may argue - with reference to pervasive, ever stronger competition dictating more and more demanding pre-qualification criteria - that at least a small number of our team sports really pulled off a big game! Both of our football teams made it to the final and were there to go for the gold!
True, both of them kicked off as favorites, but the road to fulfil the promise was fraught with danger.
The women’s handball team had their ups and downs in their group - no sweat against Angola, a hard-won victory against France, a rocket start turning into a withering defeat against South Korea, and a touch-and-go match ending in a draw against Romania - and presumably all the girls saw themselves flying home in the quarterfinal against Austria … then they somehow got back into the game, scored four quick goals and equalized in crunch time, then took the upper hand in overtime. Later in the semifinal they slammed title-holder Norway into the floor, and the Hungarian miracle continued in the final – up to about the 15th minute of the second half. Then the inspiration abruptly failed, a blackout came – turning the 6-goal lead against Denmark into a four-goal defeat. The professional analysis of the final is a topic in itself - perhaps the early setting-in of a cheering mood, a sign of inadequate sportsmanship - but all in all the result was fantastic: 24 years after the Montreal bronze, Hungarian women’s handball was upgraded at the Games, producing the best Olympic performance ever.
Another top team sport, water polo, achieved exactly the same medal as their predecessors did almost a quarter of a century ago in Montreal: gold. The much-coveted gold medal that remained out of our reach at the Olympic Games ever since, the one taken (twice) by the team coached by Dénes Kemény at the European Championship and the World Cup. This time, the team made it to the top by having its share of momentary setbacks, for example, it was beaten by both successor states of the former Yugoslavia (Yugoslavia and Croatia), but when the going really got tough during the direct elimination stage, they did not falter in their resolve. They first easily defeated Italy without the helping instructions of their coach - Mr. Kemény was exiled from the pool to the bleachers more by international intrigue than his own unchecked temper - then in the semifinals they returned the courtesy to the Yugoslavians in a heated waterfront battle. And that was only the beginning, for then came a phenomenal performance against the Russians in the Olympic final. They won the most impressive victory of all team finals in the Games, beating even the show of the miraculous American women’s basketball ‘Dream Team’; in boxing terminology, they simply outclassed their opponents, not for a moment letting the onlookers be in doubt as to the identity of the would-be winner.
The triumph of Szilveszter Csollány in the rings final of the gymnastics competition was equally impressive. The blond Hungarian who had already raked in tons of silver medals in the past now left his peers lagging far behind. In this ”notoriously biased” discipline he relegated the members of the jury to the role of mere spectators; those jury members who had made him and all Hungarian sport fans swallow the bitter pill so many times before. This time, however, even neutral eyes had to admit his superiority.
It was thought before the Games that Ágnes Kovács was equally, if not more, likely to bring the gold medal in the women’s 200 meters breaststroke home as Csollány. The 18-year-old swimmer from Budapest finally made it happen in a spine-tingling run-in, thus continuing a succession of victories started and run by Krisztina Egerszegi between 1988 and 1996. Since Seoul, all the Olympic Games saw a Hungarian swimmer lady winning gold.
The first Hungarian Olympic gold to be celebrated at the Sydney Games was won under quite different circumstances, but was nevertheless just as brilliant and dear. Fencer Tímea Nagy successfully combined technical finesse, competitive spirit and superhuman powers of concentration to beat all of her challengers in the fencing competition. Her tightest bout was the one against the Olympic title-holder, many times world champion Laura Flessel. Nagy defeated the French champion with exceptionally intelligent fencing, by keeping a level head all through. (Who could have guessed at the moment of her victory, with only the first round over, that hers would be the only Hungarian fencing medal of the Games?)
Coming back to our champions, let us return to canoeing. It obviously will remain a subject of endless debate what would have happened if the jury - apparently hearing a word whispered by the NOB above - had not tried to “take the competitors’ side” so strongly, and had voted to postpone the heats further or eventually cancel the events. Accepting, though, the position that many of those present had prepared mostly or exclusively for this race, the jury gave the contest the go-ahead after six hours deliberation, and the decision proved to be an excellent one for Hungary. It is true that although in the vast majority of the 500 m finals subject to gusts of wind and crushing waves those in the lanes on the protected far side of the beach came in victorious and won the medals, but this does not blemish the triumph of canoeist György Kolonics and the Imre Pulai-Ferenc Novák duo, or the kayak team Zoltán Kammerer and Botond Storcz. At that particular moment and under the specific circumstances they proved the best, bringing great joy to millions of Hungarians in the country and elsewhere in the world.
Besides our other medallists (wrestling - Sándor Bárdosi; boxing - Zsolt Erdei, pentathlon - Gábor Balogh; rifle-shooting - Diána Igaly; weightlifting - Erzsébet Márkus) one should not ignore two events that had not gained us any medals but in absolute sporting terms were just as valuable. Table tennis players Csilla Bátorfi and Krisztina Tóth put up a tremendous fight against their far-better-ranked Asian opponents both in the semifinals and the bronze match, and in both cases only nuances decided the outcome of the game - not in our favor. Adding to that, the international traditions of the discipline have it that the losers in both semifinals are considered to be bronze medallists - unfortunately, the Olympic rules say it otherwise. The other extra bonus-point, a 5th place by cyclist Szilvia Szabolcsi was at the same time setting the best classification ever held in the discipline.
Having spoken about champions, medallists, and surprise qualifications, a word of caution is in order here about those who never really got into the Games and disappointed the public. The most severe criticism goes perhaps to the athletes. The participants who made up the largest delegation of all time (38 individuals) failed to obtain results worth a single Olympic point. And, although it is beyond debate that the competition here was the hottest, this poor participation cannot be justified by even the most elusive arguments. Especially, when we mention that among the 38 athletes, no one managed to come close to their personal best...
Our judokas (6 participants - 0 points), and our divers, perhaps holding greater promise, performed equally poorly.
And, of course, sports fans expected more from our pentathlonists. In both men’s and women’s numbers, we delegated the world champion title holders to the Sydney Games, but although Gábor Balogh’s silver medal is a fair achievement, Zsuzsanna Vörös only came in to take 15th place.
All things considered, one may again borrow some technical terms from boxing to conclude that (the competitive branch of) Hungarian sport was judged at the Sydney Olympic Games, and although was not found entirely wanting (light or featherweight), the heavyweight class was also not deserved, and one should settle for something akin to welter or middleweight …
