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Asian countries, barring India, make a big splash
Even as the Indian campaign never quite took off in Athens, a handful of other Asian countries have secured at least one title each.
Even as the Indian Olympic campaign never quite took off in Athens, a handful of other Asian countries, including Thailand, Indonesia and United Arab Emirates, have secured at least one title each with continental powerhouse China giving the world's leading sports nation USA a run for their money.
China were, in fact, leading the gold medal race till the athletics events commenced and at the end of the 11th day of the Games were strongly placed to take the number two position behind the US with a tally of 24-15-12, slightly above their pre-Games expectation of 20 yellow metals.
The Asian giants, however, were yet to crack open the gold medal chest in the blue riband discipline, athletics, but in ten other events they have climbed the topmost perch on the podium with weightlifting providing the Chinese their biggest bonanza.
The Chinese had picked up a tally of 28 gold at Sydney four years ago and are already looking well set to better that tally with five more days left for the Games to come to a close.
While China were expected to do very well and at least finish among the top three, Japan have been the real surprise pack from the continent this time around.
The Japanese had a pretty unimpressive show in the 2000 Games, with a tally of 5-8-5 for a 14th place finish. However, they have learnt lessons from that poor show four years later, indicated by their medal haul of 15-8-9. It has given them the third spot till date, going into the final stretch of the extravaganza.
But their successes have also come in the swimming pool, gymnastics, women's wrestling - which made its debut here, and in a historic event in which they have a long history of glory - marathon.
Woman marathoner Mizuki Noguchi ran the gruelling 42.2-km event in and around places where the immortal Phidippides, with his body soaked in blood, made that historic run in fifth century BC to announce the defeat of the Persian army by the Greeks before collapsing to death due to exhaustion.
Korea, tenth in Sydney, were lying in the 12th position with a heist of 6-10-5. They had captured eight gold in Australia four years ago and can still outstrip or at least equal that tally.
Women's weightlifting, and not boxing, has provided the Thais with two gold medals here, one better than what they got in the previous Games.
Indonesia's gold has come in their traditional strong suit of badminton with shuttler Taufik Hidayat stopping Korea's Shon Seung Mo in the men's singles final.
Even UAE, a country with a miniscule population compared to India, have made history by winning a gold medal in double trap shooting. This was the event in which India's Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore fetched the country its first ever silver medal, the only podium finish so far for the nation of over one billion people.
After making history through Rathore, India spoiled much of the silver medal's sheen, when two of its women lifters were caught for doping for the first time in an Olympics. That has been the sordid tale so far.
