Olympic Games: Courier latest to bite the dust

Jim Courier became the latest to meet a dusty death on the clay courts of Barcelona when he was beaten in straight sets yesterday by Marc Rosset. Top-seeded in the men's singles, the world's No. 1 went down 6-4, 6-2, 6-1 in the third round to the big-serving Swiss.

Since winning the French Open in June, Courier has won only four tournament matches and, following his defeat, he left the stadium without saying a word. While embarrassed US team officials went in search of their man, tournament organisers were also unhappy with their lot.

In the first round, it was the world No 2 Stefan Edberg who made a premature departure and now the majority of players left in the men's draw are European clay court specialists of the type lacking in drawing power.

Still, the Wimbledon finalist Goran Ivanisevic squeezed past another Swiss, Jakob Hlasek, in five sets and Spain's own Arantxa Sanchez-Vicario beat off the challenge of Germany's Barbara Rittner in the women's singles. And, looking on the bright side, Steffi Graf and Jennifer Capriati remain in contention.

SMALL, they say, is beautiful and Britain's little Rowan Williams handed out a boxing lesson to reach the quarter-finals. The 24- year-old from Birmingham had been waiting to enter the action for the best part of a week after receiving a first round bye in the light-flyweight division.

Last of the 10-strong British contingent to enter the ring, he outpointed Ghana's Stephen Ahialey 11-3 to join the light-heavyweight Steve Wilson in the last eight and now faces the busy Filipino, Roel Velasco.

SUFFICE to say there should not be a boom next year of bouncing babies with a pedigree for sporting stardom. All-comers' records can continue, though, thanks to the great 60,000-condom give away by the Olympic organisers. This came about after competitors had complained that they were short of the necessary change to buy them from dispensing machines.

Now they will be to hand at a 24- hour chemist instead of in the athletes' discotheque, where hard-up competitors were surprised to learn that they had to pay for safe sex in a village where most things are free.

AFTER the worst showing in the Olympic pool for 20 years, there will be a full investigation into what went wrong in Barcelona when the team and officials come home.

A bronze from Nick Gillingham in the 200 metres breaststroke was the worst performance by Britain since David Wilkie's solitary silver in the same event at Munich in 1972. With the European championships coming to Sheffield next summer, the British coach, Terry Denison wants to know what went wrong.

Denison summed up his feelings about the games: 'I feel disappointed and frustrated because I can't explain what went wrong.

'There were a lot of talented and experienced swimmers in the squad and everything indicated they were going to do well.'

One thing the British were not weighed down with was cash. 'If the Government wanted to have excellence in sport and if they gave swimming enough money we would certainly have it because all the basics for success in Britain are there,' Denison said. 'I've been talking to some Australian coaches who told me all their leading swimmers are earning over pounds 50,000 a year. Apart from one or two, our top swimmers get peanuts compared to that.'

CARL PREAN yesterday reached the last 16 in the table tennis when beating South Korea's Choi Gyong Sop 21-16, 21-12. Prean's third win saw him finish top of his group, although the good news ended there when he drew Jan-Ove Waldner, the former world champion from Sweden, at the knock-out stage of the tournament.

Meanwhile, Britain's Gill Clark and Julie Bradbury moved to within a win of a badminton medal when they beat the Germans Kirsten Ubben and Katrin Schmidt

18-14, 15-5 to progress to the women's doubles quarter-finals.

FINALLY, it was a case of on yer bike for the cyclist Chris Boardman. After his individual gold run, he swapped his 'Lotus Special' for a more conventional machine in the team pursuit, where four riders need to stick together for as long as possible. This the British quartet managed until meeting their match in the quarter-finals.