Baltimore Bullet v Durban Dynamo: how Chad le Clos and Michael Phelps will cause butterflies around the world tonight

Golden Touch: Le Clos and Phelps after Tuesday night

A WEEK ago, the very suggestion that South Africa would grind to a halt on a Friday night to watch two men butterflying twice up and down a swimming pool would have been laughed out of Soccer City.

Then along came Chad le Clos and his dad Bert.

When the Baltimore Bullet takes on the Durban Dynamo at London’s sparkling new Aquatics Arena tonight at 8.38pm in a rematch dubbed The Man With The Golden Touch II, the Rainbow Nation will stop to see if Kwaaaaa-Zulu’s 20-year-old can edge out the 28-year-old superstar once more.

I’ll be at the Parlotones “This Is My Story” concert at Monte Casino when the 100m butterfly final gets underway. I have just sent them a polite request to stop the music and put South Africa’s fourth medal of London 2012 live on the big screens during the concert.

Will they PUSH ME TO THE FLOOR? I think not. That would be a GIGANTIC MISTAKE. Bert will be saying BABY BE MINE.

On Tuesday night the Parlotones did exactly that at the Queen Elizabeth Hall in London, as ex-pat South Africans gathered to hear their favourite band – and paused briefly to see Le Clos produce a remarkable last-gasp win over the world’s greatest Olympian.

Tonight they’re at it again, this time over two lengths rather than four. And my, how international perceptions have changed since the 200m butterfly final. Phelps has gone on to break the Olympic records of most medals won and most golds garnered.

And with a little help from his dad, Chad has become a global brand. When he beat Phelps to the final touch in the 200m, the commentators were harping on about the great man’s “rookie mistake” and “controversial defeat”.

At the 100m semi-finals last night, with the two golden heroes in separate races, the commentators whispered: “I wonder if Phelps will hear the foot-steps of Le Clos in the final stretch tomorrow night,” and they lauded the performance of South Africa’s swimmers, pointing out that, like France, the men from the tip of the dark continent had altered swimming’s balance of power for good.

And of course, everyone was asking: Where’s Bert. That’s Chad’s dad, the bearded beauty whose post-gold chat with the BBC’s Clare Balding has become he talking point of the games. Bert hailed his son as “beautiful” four times, he used the word “unbelievable” six times and generally restored the world’s faith in father-son relationships.

Bert will be there tonight. The cameras will no doubt capture his antics in the stands as Chad goes for a second win and a record fourth gold for South Africa – with the athletics events barely underway in Stratford.

Phelps, who has seen off a tiring Ryan Lochte as the male star in a world-record studded week of action in the pool, has been highly complimentary of Le Clos since his uncharacteristic defeat on Tuesday, tweeting: “What a performance from the South African. I’ve got to know him over the past year at a few photo shoots, he’s a hard-working, talented lad.”

And Le Clos has told us about his hero-worshipping of Phelps, whom he first saw winning at Athens, aged 12: “You have no idea what this means to me. Beating my idol. I can’t believe it.” After last night's semi, he said: "It's brilliant to be racing Phelps again, but I've already shaved half a second off my best time, I don't know if I can do any more."

Strangely, while Le Clos was forced to pull out of the 200m individual medley final to focus on the 100m butterfly and Lochte has over-stretched himself on all fronts, Phelps manages to look stronger as the week goes on.

With 20 medals behind him, Phelps goes in to tonight’s race slightly quicker than Le Clos. In the 200m butterfly on Tuesday, he started the final with a slightly slower qualifying time. I think Phelps has a tiny edge going in to tonight’s 100m final… but that’s what the bookmakers thought last time.

Tonight is about revenge for Phelps. Or another sensational upset from Le Clos. Either way, swimming and London 2012 will win.

And whatever happens, South Africa will have their fourth medal.

And then, of course, we’re in to the athletics. Flag-bearer Caster Semenya in the 800m, Sunette Viljoen’s world-beating javelin, long-jumper Khotso Mokoena looking to repeat South Africa’s only medal (silver) in Beijing and, South Africa’s best shot, the 4x400m relay where Oscar Pistorius, the legless Bladerunner, may run a lap.

And don’t foget Richard Murray in the triathlon on Tuesday, Siphiso Nhlapo on BMX next Friday and Burry Stander in the mountain biking on Sunday, the last day of the Olympics.

Successful Olympic teams tend to feed off each other’s success. Why should South Africa not do the same and take us to the SASCOC promised land of a record 12 medals?

London 2012: what you can expect from tonight's Opening Ceremony

Breaking barriers: Roger Bannister

TONIGHT’S London 2012 Opening Ceremony gets underway at 9pm in Great Britain – 10pm in South Africa – with Danny Boyle’s lavish £27m production shrouded in secrecy.

Despite numerous rehearsals each witnessed by 60,000 people, the great event – and the identity of the torch-lighter – has been kept under wraps with those in the know proudly tweeting coded references with the hash-tag #keepthesurprise.

But utter secrecy cannot be ensured in the modern age of social networking when gossip crosses oceans faster than it used to cross the street. Especially when you have hundreds of nurses involved.

What we can say is that the ceremony will be packed with British cultural references which will completely bemuse those in South Africa and beyond.

There will be no jet-packed Ironman from Los Angeles 1984, nor the wall-running Superman from Beijing, the superheroes on show feature James Bond and Mary Poppins - though the visual effects from the superb South African 2010 World Cup opening will come in to play.

The production will start with Boyle, something of an anti-estblishment figure, dressing up the 65,000 capacity Stratford Stadium as England’s “green and pleasant land”. The grass and oak tree, plus traditional English rain clouds, are already in place. A 27-ton bell will get proceedings underway just hours after Big Ben five miles away bonged for ages to herald the games’ arrival.

We will see 12 horses, three cows, 70 sheep, three sheepdogs and a horse-drawn plough if the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals doesn’t get involved. Despite rumours from New Zealand, the wooly, four-legged types won’t actually be competing in the 30^th edition of the modern Olympiad.

The “green and pleasant bit” also features families having picnics, milkmaids and, ironically considering it's not an Olympic event, a village cricket game with players in caps and braces.

All this will please the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, Prince Harry, the Duke of Edinburgh, the Prince of Wales and the Duchess of Cornwall not to mention another 120 world leaders including Michelle Obama, Americans' first lady.

We were expecting to see invasions from horn-helmeted Scandinavian Vikings and Romans as Boyle takes us rapidly through a pastiche of British history… culminating in the 17^th Century Industrial Revolution. All the while, expect to see pretty young things dancing around the traditional pagan maypole with ribbons.

At one end of the stadium we’ll see an oak tree on a hill representing the history Glastonbury Tor, at the other end, something from Last Night of the Proms with musical backing featuring The Jam’s Going Underground and Vangelis’s classic sporting anthem, Chariots of Fire.

The transition from medieval Shakespeare (some of the early bits are based on a passage called Isles of Wonder from The Tempest) to Frankensteinian dark Satanic mills will shake up the crowd as we hit modern times, the bit the Conservatives in the current UK coalition government are most worried about.

At this point, expect labouring weavers, miners, steel workers and engineers backed by Lionel Bart’s Food Glorious Food, the Rolling Stones’ Satisfaction, and the Sex Pistols’ Pretty Vacant. Yes, the Sex Pistols. Punk rock, remember that?

The final segment revolves around two young girls going “out on the town” for a traditional Saturday night together. An army of real nurses – who have been rehearsing in a “Guantanamo-style” facility in dodgy Dagenham down the road – will lead a celebration of Britain’s National Health Service.

Then the iconic British references hit us hard and fast. Paul McCartney will sing “Hey Jude”, the great Beatles hit from the 60s, then the equally ancient pop group Mud will blast out Tiger Feet.

Expect to hear Relax by Frankie Goes to Hollywood and the late Amy Winehouse’s Valerie. And then witness “about 40” Mary Poppins figures, using umbrellas for parachutes, drop in to take on Harry Potter’s evil enemy Voldemort. Daniel Craig, who will be in the stadium, has pre-recorded a James Bond sequence for the Olympics, though there are some who believe David Beckham will leap out of the Bond-style helicopter live in the stadium.

The torch-lighting itself – which I believe will be carried about by Sir Roger Bannister, the 83-year-old who first broke the four-minute barrier for the mile in 1957 – involves a complex “fuse” mechanism which will burn a path along the hoardings to the permanent flame, which will be housed on the rim of the stadium roof at Stratford for the duration of both the Olympics and Paralympics for the next month.

Bookmakers stopped taking bets on Bannister blazing his octogenarian trail, though Queen Elizabeth II, King David of Los Angeles, decathlete Daley Thompson and Britain’s most successful ever Olympian Sir Steve Redgrave are also hovering hopefully with those boxes of very long matches.

And then, finally, the athletes enter. Caster Semenya will carry the flag for South Africa and Maria Sharapova will lead Russia as the 205 nations and most of their 100,000 athletes are encouraged to move swiftly around the track by a high-tempo march by Underworld, who featured on Boyle’s Trainspotting soundtrack. They've been politely asked NOT to delay proceedings by over-use of smart phones. Greece will lead the nations in, then everyone will be in alphabetical order until the hosts, Great Britain, enter last.

And, apart from a couple of speeches from International Olympic Committee president Jacques Rogge and London 2012 chairman Seb Coe, will be that.

The real start of the Olympics, the winning of the first goal medal, will take place tomorrow on The Mall, where the men’s roadrace ends after 250km involving multiple climbs of Boxhill in Surrey. Among the favourites? Mark Cavendish of Great Britain and Darryl Impey of South Africa, both fresh from the Tour de France.

Let the Games begin!

As London 2012's opening ceremony looms, what price Durban 2024?

Lord of the Rings: Durban's Moses Mabhida stadium

AS the hours to London’s top-secret opening ceremony in Stratford tick by, talk of a South African Olympic bid are sure to surface once more as the 30^th Olympic Games gets ready to rumble.

Thoughts will go back to Cape Town’s failed bid for the 2004 games, which eventually went to the Olympians’ spiritual home in Athens. But anybody who has attended a couple of Olympiads will tell you the Mother’s City’s upstart coastal rival Durban is THE perfect Olympic venue – and I can reveal that the International Olympic Committee are eager to put the City of Bananas forward as potential hosts for 2024 or 2028.

But before we get too carried away, let me tell the full story of this potentially disastrous move.

Back in 2009, when I was covering the England cricket tour for the London Evening Standard, I visited the not-quite-complete Moses Mabhida Stadium a couple of days before the Boxing Day Test at Kingsmead.

And there it all was. An Olympics waiting to happen in South Africa. One look at the sparkling new 70,000-capacity football stadium (built with provision for an athletics track if needed), standing barely 400m from the established 60,000-capacity Kings Park rugby stadium wasn’t enough on its own.

As somebody who knew Durban well from my four-year stint on the Natal Mercury and Daily News in the early 1980s, having an athletics stadium next to a major venue for the Olympic soccer was just the beginning. It wasn’t hard to pick out the nearby aquatic centre with indoor and outdoor pools and diving facilities and small-scale athletics track, a perfect warm-up venue next to Kings Park.

Barely a mile away on the other side of the perfectly-positioned railway station, there was Kingsmead, like Lord’s in London, begging to be used for archery, handball or show-jumping.

And of course, the walkway to the north beaches from the Moses Mabhida was under construction. Cue sailing, beach volleyball and triathlon along the old Marine Parade. And for rowing and outdoor swimming? Midmar Dam the other side of Pietermaritzburg. Plus an Olympic marathon stretching halfway along the famous Comrades route. We could talk too of the impressive ICC conference centre next to the Hilton Hotel and Kingsmead for table tennis, badminton and other smaller events.

Up on the Berea the old Sugarbowl tennis complex could be remodelled and across the city, Queensmead offered a purpose-built hockey facility begging to be enlarged.

On top of that, the climate in Durban around this time of year is perfect for sport. And the region offers a vast range of accommodation as an established holiday resort, drawing tourists to it’s warm, sub-tropical climate for decades. And we had the brand new King Shaka airport about to open for the World Cup too.

My vision was soon put in to print and picked up by Sunday Tribune journalist Matthew Savides. Excitement was growing before the 2010 World Cup in South Africa and it wasn’t hard to imagine a first African Olympics would follow a the continent’s first tilt at football’s greatest show on earth.

But then came these quotes from veteran British investigative journalist Andrew Jennings, who has written extensively on corruption in the IOC and Fifa: “Nobody can afford the Games. The budgets are always pitched low by local boosters, then soar.

“The only solution is to build an Olympic venue and keep the games there every four years, in the same city. But if that happened, the IOC would have no international clout and their backsides would not be kissed by monarchs, presidents and prime ministers. And there would be no kickbacks from the construction industry.”

Ouch.

The hype nearly developed in to a bid for 2020, but not quite. As the host cities gathered for 2011, government spokesman Jimmy Manyi revealed the cabinet had decided to "prioritise service delivery" over putting up a bid to host the games, which would have cost around R350m.

He explained: "The government decided it was better for the country to consolidate the gains of last year's World Cup for now and focus attention on the delivery of basic services. If any money is going to be spent, it's going to be on basic service delivery."

Though the bid had support from the SA Sports Confederation and Olympic Committee (Sascoc), local tourism, the eThekwini municpality and the KwaZulu-Natal government, there would be no bid.

But when the 123rd International Olympic Committee met in Durban in July, 2011 the gods of Olympus witnessed for themselves Durban’s potential, as did the delegates who flew in later last year for the COP17 climate change conference.

Sascoc president Gideon Sam remains eager to put Durban forward for 2024 and 2028, while President Jacob Zuma is a known supporter.

But before we get too excited, consider this.

Montreal, the Canadian hosts in 1976, are still struggling to overcome their “Olympic legacy” more than 30 years after their bash at the Games. Sydney, hosts to the most successful Olympiad in modern times in 2000, are struggling to keep their Homebush venues in working order. And the cost of Athens 2004 helped Greece to slide in to the financial mire the Hellenic nation is currently failing to deal with.

London, like Sydney, developed the run-down Stratford area for their Olympics. At the moment it’s all smiles. But the costs of hosting a modern Olympics are ridiculous.

Though Durban has the makings of a perfect host city, conservative estimates hover near the R50bn mark if they are to host a successful games.

As Istanbul, Tokyo and Madrid jostle for the right to host 2020, Rio de Janeiro and Brazil are struggling to cope with the upcoming 2014 World Cup, let alone the 2016 Olympics.

The thought of an Olympics in Durban is a truly inspiring one. A major boost for South Africa and the whole continent. But can any nation, given the current global recession, really spend that much money on a sporting event?

Read my first blog on this subject, written in 2009: http://www.nealcollins.co.uk/blog/2009/12/cooks-bland-recipe-for-ton-of-success.html

South Africa's medal-winning schedule for London 2012. Hopefully.

The spear: Sunette Viljoen is a contender in the javelin

After a sensational weekend which saw Ernie Els, Hashim Amla, Dale Steyn, Richard Murray and even Ajax Cape Town hailed as world-beaters around the globe, it's time to turn our attention to the London Olympics.

Though the top-secret opening ceremony (which will, I can reveal, may feature David Beckham as James Bond) is only on Friday, South Africa's campaign gets underway tomorrow with the football girls Banyana Banyana playing Sweden.

Though Banyana are unlikely to create an upset and take a medal, I reckon South Africa has SEVEN big medal chances, most significantly in the pool, though they may yet reach Sports Minister Fikile Mbulula's hoped-for haul of 12.

Below I've listed all the dates when South Africa can expect to claim silverware (bronzeware or even goldware).

With the swimming starting on Saturday, Chad le Clos and Cameron van der Bergh are both ranked in the world's top ten in several different events, with Le Clos likely to reach the final in both medley events (featuring all four strokes) and Van der Bergh strong in the breast-stroke over 100m and 200m.

The athletics doesn't get underway until August 3, with Caster Semenya, Khotso Mokoena, Sunette Viljoen and men’s 4x400m our most likely medalists. Semenya will have to improve significantly on her 800m times so far this year where she falls outside the world's top ten, but she has done this before, peaking out of the blue. She is predicted to win gold by the athletics bible, Track and Field Weekly.

Long-jumper Mokoena, our only medal-winner in Beijing four years ago, is an almost certain finalist, along with javelinist Viljoen and the men's 4x400m team, which might include Oscar "Bladerunner" Pistorius, who ran in the qualifiers when the team won silver at the World Championships. Pistorius, the first amputee to compete in an Olympics, admits "a strong semi-final" is as far as he's going to get in the individual 400m.

Keep an eye out too for LJ Van Zyl, the one-lap relay specialist who is also an outside hope in the men's 400m hurdles.

After his first world triathlon triumph in Hamburg last Saturday, Richard Murray, the 23-year-old from Cape Town, could big news on Tuesday, August 7 when the men take to the water, bike and trainers.

The three big team events (women’s football and men’s and women’ hockey) offer outside hopes too, particularly women's hockey, though all three teams are ranked outside the podium places.

Cycling could be another rich source of valuable metal for South Africa. Mountain-biker Burry Stander, a World Cup winner in Pietermaritzburg last season, is listed on my schedule of potential medal winners below, along with women’s road race contender Ashleigh Moolman and BMX hopeful Sifiso Nhlapo, so unlucky in Beijing.

I'm told Bridgitte Hartley could also medal in K1 500 canoeing among the blazing paddles at Dorney, and the men's coxless lightweight four came second in the last World Cup in Lucerne. There are other outside chances, but I’ve listed all the above below, featuring only Le Clos and Vd Bergh's strongest events. South Africa could also feature in the men's relay finals, Le Clos is entered for a record SEVEN events at the brand new aquadome.

SA medal winning Olympic schedule (* marks medal chance):

Wednesday, 25: Women’s football kicks off tomorrow with Banyana Banyana v Sweden

Friday, 27: Opening ceremony, watch out for Vikings and Romans

Saturday 28: Banyana Banyana second game

*Sunday 29: Women’s road race cycling: Ashleigh Moolman

*Sunday 29: Men’s 100m breast-stroke: Cameron vd Bergh
*Tuesday, 31: Men's 200m Butterfly: Chad Le Clos

*Thursday 2: Rowing: Men's lightweight four: Brittain, Ndlovu, Smith, Thompson
*Friday 3: Men's 100m Butterfly: Chad Le Clos

*Saturday 4: Men’s long jump final: Khotso Mokoena

*Sunday 5: Men’s 100m final: Usain Bolt etc and women’s marathon with strong SA team

*Tuesday 7: Men’s triathlon: Richard Murray

*Thursday 9: Women’s K1 500: Bridgitte Hartley

*Thursday 9: Women’s javelin final, Sunette Viljoen.

*Friday 10: Men’s BMX final: Sifiso Nhlapo

*Friday 10: Men’s 4x400m relay: Oscar Pistorius, Van Zyl, Fredericks, Ofentse Mogawane, Willie de Beer and Shaun de Jager.

Friday 10: Women’s hockey final

Saturday 11: Men’s hockey final

*Saturday 11: Final of women’s 800m: Caster Semenya

*Sunday 12: Men's mountain biking: Burry Stander