Is Britain the Greatest sporting nation on Earth?

[Thankyou4calling]

BJG1 said:

We don't under-perform - when you take it tiny nations or those that only won one or two medals, we got more golds per capita than anyone else at the Olympics. We have competitive teams in Rugby, Football and cricket. We are the best in the world at Darts, Snooker andMotorsports. We have one of the best tennis players in the world. We are really fking good at sport for a nation of our size, a good comparison would be Germany, who have more people, similar economy and are basically just a bit better at football and lifting weights.

Boxing, we have 10 world champs, more than the USA.

Horsey things we do well at.

Golf we are one of the leading nations.

People are quick to cite a loss or near miss but I'm looking at the bigger picture and as you say the UK is absolute top draw.

[mcelliott]

Cheese rolling

[M400 NBL]

London424 said:

At the moment there could be athletes trying to make it playing football, that could be world class in another discipline.

Diving?

[mudflaps]

Cycling.

Just lately we've become dominant in that too.

[MarshPhantom]

We're good at stuff where we don't have much competition, Cricket and Rugby for example, even the Brits are only interested in these when played at national level.

[johnxjsc1985]

mudflaps said:

Cycling.

Just lately we've become dominant in that too.

been the best track cycling nation in the world for probably more than 15 years. this was as a direct result of the Velodrome in Manchester becoming available. Sometimes we have lacked the facilities to be the best.

[mudflaps]

MarshPhantom said:

We're good at stuff where we don't have much competition, Cricket and Rugby for example

There's another nation that excels at that.

[Type R Tom]

English now 9th and Wales 10th in the world on the FIFA world rankings, maybe the UK isn't so bad at football

[john2443]

mudflaps said:

MarshPhantom said:

We're good at stuff where we don't have much competition, Cricket and Rugby for example

There's another nation that excels at that.

Fixed that for you (well, for a few days at least )

[Thankyou4calling]

To say we are good at stuff where there's little competition and cite Rugby as an example us simply nonsense.

Rugby is an incredibly competitive sport at team and International level, it has high level representation around the world with established and emerging nations.

The Rugby World Cup is on our shores this year and England, Scotland, Ireland and Wales all have teams expected to go far, if that's not high performance I don't know what is.

[MarshPhantom]

Thankyou4calling said:

To say we are good at stuff where there's little competition and cite Rugby as an example us simply nonsense.

Rugby is an incredibly competitive sport at team and International level, it has high level representation around the world with established and emerging nations.

The Rugby World Cup is on our shores this year and England, Scotland, Ireland and Wales all have teams expected to go far, if that's not high performance I don't know what is.

Yet there are only 20 teams in the so called World Cup.

[Thankyou4calling]

MarshPhantom said:

Yet there are only 20 teams in the so called World Cup.

Do you expect every team in the world to be at the World Cup? The tournament would take a year to complete.

Think about what your saying mate, even the football World Cup only has 32 teams in it.

There are 4 UK teams in the upcoming Rugby World Cup, to me that makes us a top Rugby playing nation in a sport that plenty take part in.

Do you disagree ?

[MarshPhantom]

Thankyou4calling said:

MarshPhantom said:

Yet there are only 20 teams in the so called World Cup.

Do you expect every team in the world to be at the World Cup? The tournament would take a year to complete.

Think about what your saying mate, even the football World Cup only has 32 teams in it.

There are 4 UK teams in the upcoming Rugby World Cup, to me that makes us a top Rugby playing nation in a sport that plenty take part in.

Do you disagree ?

The difference the vast majority of countries play football but Rugby is only played by a few.

[Type R Tom]

MarshPhantom said:

Thankyou4calling said:

MarshPhantom said:

Yet there are only 20 teams in the so called World Cup.

Do you expect every team in the world to be at the World Cup? The tournament would take a year to complete.

Think about what your saying mate, even the football World Cup only has 32 teams in it.

There are 4 UK teams in the upcoming Rugby World Cup, to me that makes us a top Rugby playing nation in a sport that plenty take part in.

Do you disagree ?

The difference the vast majority of countries play football but Rugby is only played by a few.

So by your reckoning only football can be used as a benchmark as no other sports are played to the same level?

[Amateurish]

Well it's reasonable for sporting success to be judged against levels of participation. SO winning the football world cup would be a bigger success that winning the quidditch world cup.

[over_the_hill]

I would agree with the OP. We can put out a world class team or competitors in virtually any sport.

We may not be top of the world class league table in all of them but at least we are in the table.

Looking at a few of the other countries mentioned

NZ - Rugby, Cricket and er .....
SA - Rugby, Cricket, a few swimmers and athletes. Given the climate there and the sport mad nature of the country I would have expected some tennis players
Canada - Ice Hockey and a few winter sports
USA - has five times the population of GB so for every good one we find they would expect to find 5.

Slightly OT but it will be interesting to see how football (soccer) progresses in the USA. They were more than half decent at the World Cup last year and if it takes off over there - probably by becoming a college sport with scholarships attached etc. - they could well have a winning team in the next 12 years.

[mudflaps]

over_the_hill said:

USA - has five times the population of GB so for every good one we find they would expect to find 5.

Agreed and yet a quick look at the Olympics Medal Tables shows they never achieve that ratio in Track & Field.

They are no longer dominant in Professional Boxing or Tennis either.

[CR6ZZ]

over_the_hill said:

Looking at a few of the other countries mentioned

NZ - Rugby, Cricket and er .....

sevens, league, sailing, rowing, kayaking, triathlon, motor racing, rallying, netball, octopush, hockey, golf, darts, squash, track cycling, mountain biking, softball, boxing, shooting, etc., etc. For many of these NZ has current or past world champions (male or female) in at least one division or discipline of a particular sport, or is placed in the top 5. In fact about the only sports Kiwis are total crap at are basketball (ranked 19th) and football (ranked 136th). Not bad for a country with little more than half the population of London.

[The Mad Monk]

CR6ZZ said:

sevens, league, sailing, rowing, kayaking, triathlon, motor racing, rallying, netball, octopush, hockey, golf, darts, squash, track cycling, mountain biking, softball, boxing, shooting, etc., etc. For many of these NZ has current or past world champions (male or female) in at least one division or discipline of a particular sport, or is placed in the top 5. In fact about the only sports Kiwis are total crap at are basketball (ranked 19th) and football (ranked 136th). Not bad for a country with little more than half the population of London.

As I posted a while back.

I am not a kiwi, but New Zealand, for its size, outperforms.

[MarshPhantom]

It's also strange how no one bats an eyelid at the fact plenty of people who play cricket for England weren't actually born here.


Ditto Chris Froome.