Australia Olympic swimming coach Rohan Taylor outlines Dolphins ambitions in Paris and addresses rivalry with USA
Australia’s swimmers have put their war of words with the United States to bed, setting their own lofty targets for the Paris Olympics.
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Australia’s swimmers have wisely called a truce in their war of words with the United States, conceding they have little real hope of finishing ahead of the Americans on the medals table at the upcoming Paris Olympics.
Instead, they have set themselves another outrageous goal: to be the greatest Australian swim team ever. And they might just pull that off because expectations are soaring.
While the rivalry with the US is genuine, the results have been far too one-sided for too long for it to be considered a serious fight.
With more people and more money, the Yanks have been beating our swimmers relentlessly for more than a century. In fact, the only time the Aussies finished as the top dogs in Olympic swimming was when the Games were held in Melbourne.
“I think the Americans are the standard of the sport. The Americans have won the medal tally at the Olympics since 1956 was when we topped it. So as far as being the best country they are and they deserve it, they’ve got the depths, they’ve got the performances,” Australia’s head coach Rohan Taylor said.
“As a whole, in every event, they’ll have somebody who can get on the podium. Our athletes have rivals with Canadians, with Great Britain, with China, with Germany so the rivalries are within the rivalries. I think when it comes down to relays, obviously we pride ourselves and realise that’s probably where you see a bit more of the team stuff.
“But the respect for the US is huge. We want to be as good as them. And so the rivalry probably is more about respect and the fact that we see ourselves as striving to be that good and be that consistently good.”
A student of history and form, Taylor’s comments will help cool the escalating war of words with the Americans, who are aggrieved that anyone would dare challenge them as the Aussies did at last year’s world titles in Fukuoka.
The Aussie team claimed a moral victory after winning more gold, but the US were officially named as the No. 1 country after winning more medals overall.
But Taylor, who was masterminded Australia’s stunning success at the last Olympics in Tokyo, said the current Dolphins team was on track to be just as good if not better in Paris.
That’s high praise because the Dolphins won nine gold medals, and 20 overall in the Japanese capital, but the statistics point to a similar haul in France.
“I think we have a pretty comparable team, where we were going into Tokyo as far as our rankings, where we sit,” Taylor said.
“And I think when I talk about that, where medals usually come from, around the top five, top eights. And then after that, it’s very, very rare these days. So it’s about getting as many athletes inside those rankings. And when you do, you can start working out.
“Our goal as a team is to convert our performance from trials into this meet, which means swim just as fast or swim faster. That’s all they need to do.
“If they can do that and they’re highly ranked, that’s when things start to happen for us. And when we have done that, we get really good, good outcomes.”
Too savvy to declare how many golds the team might win because the margins are always so tight, Taylor did say the team was tracking well just over a week before the start of the Olympics.
The squad has already completed a training camp in Canet, near the Spanish border, and has since relocated to the L’odyssee Aquatic Centre at Chartres, less than 100km from Paris.
The team for Paris includes a record number of 10 individuals who have won Olympic or world titles: Emma McKeon, Bronte Campbell, Mollie O’Callaghan, Ariarne Titmus, Kaylee McKeown, Cameron McEvoy, Kyle Chalmers, Elijah Winnington, Sam Short and Zac Stubblety-Cook.
Plenty others have won golds in relays or silver and bronze medals in individual events so Taylor said they deserved to head into Paris dreaming big.
“This team has earnt the expectations. They’ve earned it from Tokyo all the way through,” Taylor said.
“These athletes are exceptional trainers, they’re committed and they perform on the world stage. They’ve done that and so they’ve earned the expectations, I believe.
“I think they thrive on that. So for me it’s embracing that and they’ll get up and they’ll have a crack, don’t worry about that.
“From my experiences, and I’ve been on some pretty good teams, obviously with Hacketts and Thorpes and O’Neill’s in the early days, I think it’s the kind of team like the late 90s, early 2000s where you had multiple athletes who could do something special.
“Comparing era to era is one thing, but what we do have is we have a lot of strike power and it’s exciting.”
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