By IRNA,
London : British Olympic Association (BOA) chairman Colin Moynihan is confident of a significant improvement in Britain’s medal haul at Beijing but said it was “unwise” to predict that the team could overhaul Australia to finish fourth.
Britain finished 10th at the last Olympics in Athens four years ago with nine gold medals and are targeting fourth place at the London 2012 games, but the BOA is refusing to set a specific target in China.
John Steele, chief executive of UK Sport, the government agency responsible for managing and distributing public investment, set a target in April for Britain to gain eighth place in Beijing.
Predictions are that British athletes would need to win more than 30 medals, including at least 10 gold, to meet the target, but speaking at a press conference in Beijing Tuesday, Moynihan was reluctant to raise expectations.
“We do have a very strong team, better financed and better resourced than ever, and I believe this will deliver the goods and we will move significantly forward from 10th,” he was quoted saying at Team GB’s pre-Games launch.
“For a number of sports we also want to see real progress towards 2012. We are confident we will move forward from 10th but it would be unwise to speculate how close we will get to fourth,: the BOA chair said.
In Athens, Britain accumulated a total of 30 medals, coming behind the US, China, Russia, Australia, Japan, Germany, France, Italy and Korea.
The BOA has always maintained that Beijing should be seen as a stepping-stone to London 2012, where the ambition is to finish fourth in the Olympics medals table and second in the Paralympics.