Jones looks to end dissonant year on golden note

Controversial triple Olympic champion Marion Jones will try to claim the two titles she missed out on in 2000 when she competes in the long jump final and, hopefully, the 4x100 metres relay on Friday.

Controversial triple Olympic champion Marion Jones will try to claim the two titles she missed out on in 2000 when she competes in the long jump final and, hopefully, the 4x100 metres relay at the Athens Games on Friday.

HT Image

Elsewhere a mouthwatering women's 10,000m is up for grabs and Polish walking legend Robert Korzeniowski bids to add a fourth gold medal to his Olympic tally in the 50 kilometre walk.

There could also be a popular gold medal in the men's pole vault in the shape of American Toby Stephenson, dubbed the Cat in the Hat for his decision, unique among elite vaulters, to wear a helmet.

Jones, though, will be the main attraction as she bids to land the event considered up till this year her weakest - the long jump. She is also slated to compete in the 4x100m relay finals, assuming she helps the States move through from the heats.

The 28-year-old athlete has been embroiled in the doping scandal sparked by the BALCO investigation.

She has been subjected to lurid allegations of drugtaking by her bitter ex-husband CJ Hunter, while 100m world record-holder Tim Montgomery, her boyfriend and father of her 1-year-old son, has been implicated in the scandal.

Shunned by European meeting directors who used to be begging at her feet for her to come to their events, Jones showed great mettle to qualify for the long jump final on her second attempt on Wednesday.

Her jump was seventh best of the 12 who progressed to the final.

"It's going to be an interesting competition (the long jump). Things didn't work out this year as planned," admitted Jones, who failed to qualify for either of the individual titles she won in Sydney, the 100m and 200m.

Chief among her rivals for the title will be Russia's Tatyana Lebedeva, but Jones at least will not have to compete against three of the all-time top performers as France's reigning world champion Eunice Barber, and former world champions Fiona May of Italy and Niurka Montalvo of Spain all went out.

Jones admitted that she felt better about her long jumping than she had four years ago when she won bronze.

"The qualifying went so much better than in Sydney. About the final? Gosh, it's so exciting. I'm so excited. Now it's very much anyone's game."

The women's 10,000m is wide open.

Australia will be looking to Bennita Johnson to take it to the Africans as she did in the world cross country long course race earlier this year.

The 25-year-old will face a stiff task as Sally Barsosio of Kenya attempts to repeat her victory on the same track at the 1997 world championships.

Fernanda Ribeiro, the 1996 Olympic champion, is probably running more in hope than anything else, while more likely contenders are Ethiopia's Ejagayebu Dibaba, older sister of Olympic 5,000m bronze Tirunesh, and veteran Kenyan-born Dutch runner Lornah Kiplagat.

Should walk king Korzeniowski - rated the greatest of all time - prevail, it will be a more emotional victory than his previous ones.

The 36-year-old's training partner, Irishman Jamie Costin was seriously injured in a car crash here over a week ago and had to return to Ireland.