November 8, 2024

Tokyo Olympics: Ivory Coast’s Marie-Josee Ta Lou storms into Olympic 100m final

Ta Lou #TaLou

The final of the women's 100m at the Tokyo Olympics The final of the women’s 100m at the Tokyo Olympics

Ivory Coast sprinter Marie-Josee Ta Lou finished fourth in the women’s 100m final for the second consecutive Olympics as Jamaica claim a clean sweep.

Both Ivory Coast and Egypt have been knocked out of the men’s football at the quarter-final stage by Spain and Brazil respectively.

Seven Africans including three athletes from South Africa qualify for Sunday’s semi-finals of the men’s 100 metres.

BBC Sport Africa will be updating this page with the highlights for the continent on day eight of the Tokyo Olympics.

Athletics afternoon session

Ivory Coast’s Josee-Marie Ta Lou finished fourth in the final of the women’s 100m final, just as she did at the Rio Games in 2016.

Ta Lou ran 10.91 seconds but was beaten by the Jamaican trio, with Elaine Thompson-Herah running the second fastest time ever to retain her title with another two-time Olympic champion Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce in silver and Shericka Jackson claiming bronze.

Earlier in the semi-finals Ta Lou ran another fast time to qualify for the final of as she won her semi-final.

Ta Lou clocked a time of 10.79 just one hundredth slower than her heat on Friday, when she equalled the African record held by her compatriot Murielle Ahoure, who failed to qualify for the final.

Grace Nzubechi Nwokocha from Nigeria also failed to progress from the semi-finals.

Nigerian sprinter Enoch Adegoke at the Tokyo Olympics Nigerian sprinter Enoch Adegoke set a new personal best in his heats at the Tokyo Olympics

Nigerian Enoch Adegoke was the fastest African to qualify for the men’s 100m semi-finals on Sunday as he set a new personal best of 9.98 seconds to win his hear.

Ferdinand Omwurwa Omanyala, who had battled to be included in the Kenyan team for the games, set a new national record of 10.01 to advance as well.

All three South Africans – Gift Leotlela, Akani Simbine and Shane Maswanganyi – will also be in semi-finals as will be Nigeria’s Usheoritse ‘Dushos’ Itsekiri and Arthur Cisse of Ivory Coast.

However there was controversy when Nigeria’s Divine Oduduru was disqualified for a false start in his heat despite no one being kicked out of the heat for an similar offence moments earlier.

Togo’s Fabrice Dbala was also disqualified for a false start.

Ethiopia’s Habitam Alemu will be the only African in the women’s 800m final on Tuesday, as she qualified with the second fastest tie of the semi-finals.

It was a disappointing Olympics for Ugandan world champion Halimah Nakaayi, who recorded the slowest time of the semi-finals as she failed to reach the final.

Her compatriot Winnie Nanyondo, Benin’s Noelie Yarigo, Kenya’s Mary Moraa and Moroccan Rababe Arafi also all failed to progress.

South Africa’s former world bronze medallist Ruswahl Samaii’s leap of 7.74m in qualifying was not enough for him to reach the final of the men’s long jump.

His compatriot Cheswill Johnson failed to record a legal jump and so was also eliminated.

Athletics morning session

South Africa’s Wanda Nel finished third in her heat for the women’s 400m hurdles to qualify automatically for Monday’s semi-finals.

Kenya’s Ferguson Cheruiyot Rotich was the fastest qualifier from the heats of the men’s 800m to reach Sunday’s semi-finals.

The other African athletes to qualify automatically were Botswana’s 2012 Olympic silver medallist Nijel Amos, Tunisia’s Abdessalem Ayouni, as well as two more Kenyans – Michael Saruni and Emmanuel Korir.

While Moroccan duo Oussama Nabil and Abdelati El Guesse, who set a personal best, both progressed as fastest losers.

In the women’s 100m hurdles Nigeria’s Amusan Tobi reached Saturday’s semi-finals with the seventh fastest time with Liberia’s Ebony Morrion also progressing as a fastest loser.

Football Spain celebrate their fifth goal against Ivory Coast in the quarter-finals of the men's football at the Tokyo Olympics Spain celebrate their fifth goal against Ivory Coast in the quarter-finals of the men’s football at the Tokyo Olympics

There was double disappointment for Africa in the men’s football as both Egypt and Ivory Coast were knocked out in the quarter-finals.

Ivory Coast were eliminated by Spain, who needed extra-time to eventually win the match 5-2.

The Ivorians were minutes away from reaching the semi-finals of the men’s football but Spain scored a late equaliser to make it 2-2 and force extra-time.

Manchester United defender Eric Bailly gave the Ivorians the lead after just three minutes before RB Leipzig’s Dani Olmo equalised on the half-hour mark,

Turkey-based Max Gradel looked like he had won the game for Ivory Coast with a goal in the first minute of added time at the end of the match only for Rafa Mir to equalize for Spain moment later.

Spain took the lead in the first period of extra-time when Real Sociedad’s Mikel Oyarzabal converted a penalty after a handball by Bailly.

Wolverhampton Wanderers’ Mir added two more goals in the second-half of extra-time to complete his hat-trick and confirm Spain’s place in the last four.

Egypt lost to reigning gold medallists Brazil 1-0 with the only goal of the game being scored by Hertha Berlin’s Matheus Cunha in the 37th minute.

Basketball

Nigeria’s men have been knocked out of the Olympics after suffering a third straight defeat in Group B as they lost 80-71 to Italy.

D’Tigers had gone into the Tokyo Games with high hopes after beating both the USA and Argentina in warm-up matches before travelling to Japan.

Volleyball

Kenya’s women were eliminated on Saturday as they once again lost 3-0 (25-19, 25-18, 25-10) this time to Dominican Republic.

It means the Kenyans cannot progress to the quarter-finals even if they were to spring a huge surprise and overcome the unbeaten Brazilians in their final Pool A match on Monday.

Beach Volleyball

Kenya’s Gaudencia Makokha and Bracksides Khadambi are out of the women’s event after losing once again, this time 2-0 (21-6, 21-14) to Latvia’s Tina Graudina and Anastasjia Kravcenoka in the women’s event.

Boxing

Rady Garmane failed in her bid to become only the second Mozambican athlete to ever win an Olympic medal along with 800m great Maria Mutola, who won gold in Sydney 2000 after claiming bronze four years earlier in Atlanta.

She lost 4-1 on points to Zemfira Magomedalieva from the Russian Olympic Committee team in Saturday’s quarter-finals.

Handball

Angola’s women kept alive their slim hopes of reaching the quarter-finals with a 28-25 win over hosts Japan.

The Angolans can progress if they can win their final match against South Korea on Monday and hope Japan lose to Norway, who have already qualified for the last eight.

Hockey

South Africa’s women have been eliminated after losing all five of their Group A games in Tokyo, with a final 4-3 loss to India on Saturday.

Rugby sevens

Kenya’s women finished tenth out of the 12 competing nations in Japan as they lost their play-off match 24-10 to Canada.

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