Olympics 24: Will our 4x400m ladies team make history tonight

Team Ireland’s women’s 4x400m team will make more sporting history tonight when they contest their first ever Olympic final (8:14pm Irish time), on the final night of action at the Stade de France.

Sophie Becker, Phil Healy, Kelly McGrory and Sharlene Mawdsley caused a sensation by finishing third in their semi-final yesterday, behind Jamacia and Netherlands, earning an automatic qualifying spot to this historic decider.

The squad will be further strengthened for the final by the addition of Rhasidat Adeleke after her fourth place finish in the women’s 400m last night.

Adeleke’s inclusion will shave some time off Ireland’s impressive qualifying time of 3:25.05 and they will need all of that as reigning Olympic champions USA qualified with a time of 3:21.44, and four more of the qualifiers – Jamaica, Great Britain, France and Belgium – all ran sub 3:25.

Netherlands were just outside that with 3:25:03 but, with Femke Bol to come into their squad now, the reigning European champions will also be faster in tomorrow’s decider.

The Irish 4x400m record is 3:22.71 from the European final in June where they claimed silver ahead of the Belgians who will also contest tomorrow’s final.

The USA have won every women’s 4x400m relay at the Olympics since 1996 and look set to win their eighth straight title as they looked particularly impressive, qualifying more than three seconds ahead of Britain. Jamaica are also always strong and won bronze in Tokyo three years ago.

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