By Sportswriters Zhang Wei and Lou Chen
BEIJING, Aug. 24 (Xinhua) -- The Australian team fell short of their fourth finish at the 2004 Athens Olympic Games with a sixth placing in the gold medal tally in Beijing.
With a relatively disappointing performance in swimming and a sharp drop in cycling, the Aussies failed to achieve their goal of a third consecutive top-five finish on the medal table in Beijing.
Sending a strong delegation of 434 athletes to Beijing, Australia snatched a total of 46 medals, including 14 golds, while traditional powerhouse Germany and a rising Britain surpassed them to take the fifth and the fourth respectively.
After staging the 1956 Melboune Olympics, host Australia peaked in the Sydney Games in 2000 by winning 58 medals, including 16 golds, to finish fourth in the medal tally. Four years later, the Aussies repeated their fourth placing in Athens, thanks to the country's highest ever gold tally of 17.
The Australian cyclists won an unprecedented six golds, two silvers and two bronze medals four years ago but failed to clinch any title in Beijing, as their dominant British peers claimed seven out of 10 gold medals in the velodrome and added one more from the road event.
Anna Meares' silver in the women's sprint was Australian cycling' s only podium finish in Beijing, but the 24-year-old and even the whole Oceanian nation were proud of this medal.
As a gold medallist in Athens, Meares crashed in a World Cup event in January and broke her neck badly. But the two time world champion refused to give up her cycling career and fought her way back to qualify for the Beijing Games.
What's more, the decline of the Australian cycling seemed only temporary as their junior team topped the medal table with seven golds, five silvers and three bronzes at the Junior World Championships this July in Cape Town, South Africa.
"Those athletes were judged not ready for this Olympics but we are in a good position going into 2012," said the Australian Olympic Committee boss John Coates, according to the Australian media.
Australian swimmers bagged 20 medals including six golds, only behind the United States with 12 golds led by wunderkind Michael Phelps.
Although the retirement of five-time Olympic champion Ian Thorpe two years ago was regarded as a big loss for Australian swimming, the six world record holders still made their Olympic squad significantly dazzling.
Both Leisel Jones and Libby Trickett clinched their first individual titles and contributed a lot for a world record breaking race to win the women's 4X100-meter medley relay gold. However, neither the breaststroke specialist Jones nor the amazing sprinter Trickett was able to claim one more victory as expected.
Jones lost her reign in the 200-meter breaststroke since the 2005 World Aquatic Championships together with her world record to American rookie Rebecca Soni. As the world record holder in both the 50-meter and 100-meter freestyle, Trickett could not touch the wall first in both finals.
Their teammate Jessica Schipper lost her world record in the women's 200-meter butterfly while the Chinese teenage duo Liu Zige and Jiao Liuyang pushed themselves forward shockingly. Sprinter Eamon Sullivan grabbed back the fame of the world's fastest swimmer but couldn't collect any title from the 50-meter and 100-meter events.
But it was the team captain Hackett who suffered most as the long-distance king finally surrendered to the younger hopefuls.
The 28-year-old giant overcame the blow of a Waterloo defeat in Melbourne last year and recharged his battery full, targeting a third Olympic title in the men's 1,500-meter freestyle. But after being totally out of the pace in the 400-meter final, Hackett also failed to catch up with an accelerating Oussama Mellouli from Tunisia in the most grueling event in the pool.
Fortunately, the sailing team had its best offshore Olympics with two golds and one silver, and three-time world champion Emma Snowsill won the women's triathlon, notching up Australia's first Olympic gold in the event.
Although star athlete Jana Rawlinson as the world 400 meters hurdles champion was forced to withdraw from Australia's Olympic team because of a long-standing toe injury, the 26-year-old Steve Hooker redeemed it by winning the men's pole vault with a new Olympic record of 5.96 meters.
What's more, Matthew Mitcham edged host favorite Zhou Luxin in the final round in the men's platform to become the only non-Chinese winner in the eight diving events.
