‘Bling’ misses out on the bling – but may try again

[Pelican Press 0]

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‘Bling’ misses out on the bling – but may try again

Michael Matthews, the *********** rider known as ‘Bling’, has ******* to land the one bauble he really wanted in the Olympic road race.

Matthews, at the age of 33, was delighted to at last get his first chance at competing at a Games and felt the hilly course might be ideal for a punchy rider like him.

But the three-strong Aussie team, already disrupted because of Luke Plapp’s Games-ending injuries after a ****** in the time trial, never got into the mix.

Instead, Remco Evenepoel delivered a masterclass, attacking relentlessly over three climbs around Montmatre to claim gold, the young Belgian superstar becoming the first man to complete the road race-time trial double.

Matthews ended up battling home 15th, two minutes 13 seconds down on the runaway champion, who even managed to survive the late scare of a puncture, 4km from the finish, to still win by 71 seconds.

“It didn’t go according to plan,” said Matthews, who had Simon Clarke (32nd) and late substitute Ben O’Connor (51st) as teammates trying to help push him into the frame.

“Obviously, we wanted to be fighting for a medal today, so disappointed.

“The legs were good on the climb, I was one of the few that wasn’t that far off the (Mathieu) van der Poel and (Wout) van Aert group, so finishing where I finished is disappointing.

“Teams like Belgium, with two clear leaders, they can run two game plans with van Aert and Evenepoel – one with a long move and one for a reduced sprint – so that was key for them.”

Asked whether he felt this would be his last Games, Matthews shrugged.

“We’ll see. I’m 33 now, so hopefully there’ll be one more, another shot, but we’ll have to wait a couple of years now,” he said.

Teammate Clarke was similarly disappointed but understanding.

“We dreamed of a better result obviously, but taking on the world with two riders and a reserve is a big challenge,” he said.

“We left it all out there and, unfortunately, it wasn’t what we hoped for, but we went down fighting we will bounce back for the next one.”

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#Bling #misses #bling

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