The 2012 Olympic Pre-Season is now complete for Women’s Foil with the conclusion of the Women’s Team Foil event in St. Petersburg, Russia.
Italy walked away from the event with a 42-40 victory over Russia for the gold and the #1 Olympic seed. All in all, Italy is the odds-on favorite for the Olympic Gold with a record of 11-1 against the field.
Going into the event, the United States was the 5th seed and looked to be matched up against Poland. In 2008 the US team used an upset of Poland to start their run to a silver medal finish, and the team felt confident that they could pull off a similar upset this year. The US/Poland match will not happen, however, since the US team fell in the round of 8, finishing 5th. France took 3rd and edged ahead of the USA in overall team points which will give France the #5 seed.
The US team loses a decent pairing by dropping to 5th. Instead of going against Poland (where they have a 1-1 record), the US will be matched against Korea. Korea owns a 4-0 record for the season vs. the USA.
The swap puts France up against Poland, who they crushed this event; so they can move up to get their Top 4 loss to Italy early and face Korea for the bronze. Korea is 2-1 against France for the season in addition to a better rank overall, so Korea is likely to edge them out in a closer match than the others.
Overall, 4 of the 9 teams have a better than 50% win percentage vs. the field. 3 of them are in the top-4 of the FIE rankings. Poland is the aberration, sitting in 4th with a 3-5 record against the field.
Compiling the Match Data:
Here’s the data that we’ve collected. This represents the 2011-2012 season and shows matches between teams that are in the Olympic field. We felt it important to get a feel for wins and losses vs. the tournament field and not just over winning percentage since team events play more to match-ups and teams that are able to rack up early round wins don’t have that benefit at the Olympics.
The boxes show the victories by row vs. the country by column. An “X” indicates we don’t have a current season match between the two countries.
| Country | ITA | RUS | KOR | POL | FRA | USA | JPN | EGY | GBR | Victories | Defeats | Win % | ||
| 1 | Italy | 3 | 1 | 3 | 3 | X | 1 | X | X | 11 | 1 | 91.67% | ||
| 2 | Russia | 1 | 1 | X | 0 | 1 | 3 | 1 | X | 7 | 1 | 87.50% | ||
| 3 | Korea | 0 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 4 | X | X | 2 | 9 | 3 | 75.00% | ||
| 4 | Poland | 0 | X | 1 | 0 | 1 | X | X | 1 | 3 | 5 | 37.50% | ||
| 5 | France | 0 | 1 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 1 | X | X | 7 | 2 | 77.78% | ||
| 6 | USA | X | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 2 | X | X | 3 | 7 | 30.00% | ||
| 7 | Japan | 0 | 0 | X | X | 0 | 0 | X | 1 | 1 | 7 | 12.50% | ||
| 8 | Egypt | X | 0 | X | X | 0 | 0 | X | X | 0 | 1 | 0.00% | ||
| 9 | GBR | X | X | 0 | 0 | X | X | 1 | X | 1 | 4 | 20.00% | ||
| 1 | 1 | 3 | 5 | 2 | 7 | 7 | 1 | 4 |
Bracket Predictions:
Looking at the team standings after St. Petersburg presents the following bracket for Women’s Team Foil:
8/9: Egypt vs. Great Britain.
This is the equivalent of the “Play-In games” in March Madness. The combined record of these teams against the Olympic field is 1-5 and the winner gets to face Italy.
Quarterfinals:
1/8 – Italy vs. EGY/GBR: Unless something unthinkable happens, this will be a tune up round for Italy and a great opportunity to play their 4th in to make sure they are counted for Olympic participation. Italy’s only loss for the season against this field has been to Russia. Neither of these teams in near that caliber and they don’t have the ability to stall a match like Korea can.
4/5 – Poland vs. France: France saw that they have a good match strategy against Poland, beating them 45-32 in St. Petersburg. Poland is 0-3 for the season against France. France moves on to see if they can figure out Italy.
3/6 – Korea vs. USA: 2008 proved that the US team can act as the giant killer. Still, an 0-4 record against Korea anchored by Nam is a very difficult thing to overcome. I’ll be rooting for the US, but the numbers point to a Korea win.
2/7 – Russia vs. Japan: Japan is 1-7 against the Olympic field with their only victory against Great Britain. Russia defeated Japan 39-23 at the last event. Russia moves on to face Korea.
Semi-Finals:
Italy vs. France: Italy is 3-0 against Poland. They should move on to face the Russia/Korea winner.
Russia vs. Korea: They met for the first time this season in St. Petersburg where Russia used home field advantage to dominate 45-25. Korea will most likely look to slow the pace down to try for a close victory. Still, Russia has the weapons to win this one.
Bronze Medal: Korea vs. France: Korea has the edge on this match up with a 2-1 record for the season. Korea in a tight match.
Gold Medal: Italy vs. Russia. Russia owns the lone victory against Italy this season. Still, Italy is 3-1 against them. This should be a good match but we’re predicting Italy wins.
Predicted Medal Finish:
Gold: Italy
Silver: Russia
Bronze: Korea
Photo Credit: Federscherma.it
