Outraged Aussie Olympics chiefs could send coach home over bizarre ‘un-Australian comments’ ahead of Paris 2024
AN AUSTRALIAN swimming coach has been carpeted – for cheering on one of the team’s Korean rivals.
Michael Palfrey is working with four of the Aussie team in Paris.
But he previously coached Korea’s 400m freestyle world champion Kim Woo-min, who faces a showdown with Australia’s Sam Short and Elijah Winington.
In a TV interview for a Seoul-based station Palfrey said: “I really hope he can win, but ultimately I really hope he swims well, Go Korea!”
That, though, has caused outrage in the Aussie camp and could see Palfrey, who has made an apology, sent back home.
Head coach Rohan Taylor said: “These comments are un-Australian.
“We are very disappointed, extremely disappointed. For a coach on our team to promote another athlete ahead of our athletes is not acceptable.
“For me, my priority is the performance of the team, the performance of the athletes.
“Now I need to look at the performance of the team and make a judgement call on that.”
The internal row comes with the Aussie squad already locked in a public spat with their USA rivals – in a storm which saw legend Michael Phelps branded a “t****r” by an Aussie newspaper.
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Aussie sprint freestyler Cate Campbell, who missed out on selection, accused the Americans of being “such, such sore losers”.
She also claimed they wound up her team at the 2023 World Championships by ringing a cowbell in the pre-race “call” area to prompt chants of “USA! USA!”
Phelps hit back and the war of words degenerated, with US star Katie Ledecky admitting: “Everyone has seen all the videos going around.
“All we can do is focus on ourselves and what we can do to perform.
“There’s always the internal fire. We’re very competitive and things like this bring that out even more.”