Beijing gold medalist Matthew Mitcham heads 10-strong Australian diving team ... - Washington Post

BRISBANE, Australia â€" Matthew Mitcham prevented a Chinese sweep of the diving gold medals at the Beijing Olympics with a stunning final dive, so he’s not really concerned about Tom Daley getting any advantage from competing in a home pool at London.

Mitcham won the 10-meter platform against the odds at Beijing and is growing increasingly confident he can do it again, despite coming off an abdominal injury that kept him out of competition for nine months.

“I feel now I am alleviated from that pressure,” of being favorite, he said. “People don’t expect me to live up to defending my title, just because I’ve been out of the pool for almost a year with the injuries and have had such an interrupted preparation with the re-injuries of the ab.

“So I feel that is working to my advantage. Now I can spend the next two months just training as hard as I can without that expectation weighing me down.”

Mitcham was ranked No. 2 in the world in 2008 and rose to No. 1 in 2010 after winning the World Cup, again in China. But a torn abdominal muscle restricted his training in 2011 and he was thankful just to be confirmed in the team this week for the London Games. He’s avoiding competition in the next two months, preferring instead to keep training in a bid to get back to peak physical shape.

The 24-year-old Australian knows he won’t get back to the “super human strength” that he felt a few years back, but will be relying on his experience in big time competition to kick in if he can get himself to a point where he can attempt the really high value dives. Even if he doesn’t, he has backup dives which still earned him scores of 10 at the Olympic trials.

“I know, tactically, whichever way I go, I do have the potential to be an Olympic medalist again in 2012,” he said. “Really, anything can happen on the day as was demonstrated in Beijing when nobody expected anything from me but I came second in the prelims, the next day I came second in the semis and then I ended up winning the finals against all expectations.”

Daley, who became known as “The Boy Wonder” when he won the 2009 world championship at the age of 15, faces enormous expectations in front of his home crowd. He has been ranked No. 1 and won the world and Commonwealth Games titles, as well as reached the final at Beijing four years ago.

But he relinquished his world title and finished fifth at Shanghai last year, when Qiu Bo won the 10-meter platform to complete a gold medal sweep for China. The British diver later announced plans to take six months off school before the Olympics in a bid to be completely prepared for the London Games.

“Tom is one of the best in the world, but the Chinese are still the best in the world,” Mitcham said. “Poor Tom â€" he’s got the pressure of being at a home games and having the expectation of the whole country resting on his shoulders. I don’t envy the position he’s in.

But, “I’m just concerned about myself and my preparation. That’s all I can control â€" how I dive.”

The Australian team announced Tuesday also includes Loudy Wiggins, who will become only the second Australian diver to compete at four Olympics.

Wiggins joins fellow Australian diver Jenny Donnet as the only Australian diver to compete at four Olympic Games when she joins partner Rachel Bugg in the 10 meter platform synchronized event.

At her first Olympics, Wiggins became the first Australian to win a diving medal since Dick Eve in 1924 when she won bronze at Sydney in the 10 meter platform synchronized.

Melissa Wu, a silver medalist in the synchronized 10-meter synchronized platform in Beijing, is also returning.

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Australian team: Brittany Broben (10m platform individual), Rachel Bugg (10m platform synchronized), James Connor (10m platform individual), Matthew Mitcham (10m platform individual), Jaele Patrick (3m springboard individual), Anabelle Smith (3m springboard synchronized), Sharleen Stratton (3m springboard individual, synchronized), Ethan Warren (3m springboard individual), Loudy Wiggins (10m platform synchronized), Melissa Wu (10m platform individual).

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