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Superstar hurdler Liu Xiang  is still not fully fit on the eve of his Beijing Games debut, the  defending champion's coach said.
'He still feels some pain in the heel after training,' Liu's coach, Sun Haiping, was quoted as saying by Sports.cn, the official website of the State General Sports Administration.
Sun said he hoped 'daily treatment will help him alleviate the pain before the race'.
The latest statement set alarm bells ringing among tens of millions of ardent followers of the 25-year-old Shanghai native, who has been  expected to provide the  Beijing Games with the kind of climactic moment that Australian sprinter Cathy Freeman  did in the Sydney Olympics.
Liu will take to the track  tomorrow morning in his first heat. The  final is scheduled for Thursday,  after another two heats.
His doctor believes Liu's injury lies mainly in the periosteum,  or bone membrane, of the heel rather than the heel bone itself.
'Something is wrong with his [heel] bone membrane,  which makes him feel some pain or discomfort in training,' the unnamed doctor was quoted as saying.
'The pain and discomfort  occur intermittently, which will affect his performance if  they occur in a race.'
Liu and his team  moved into the  Olympic Village yesterday  and   begin training  today, according to the website.
Multiple rounds of preliminary races will be tough on all runners,  and they  are expected to  achieve 12.9 seconds or faster to get a chance at  gold  in the 110-metre hurdle race.
'On the one hand, each runner has to go through the tough ordeal;  on the other,  they must distribute their physical power reasonably along the way for the gold medal. Therefore I think it will be extremely difficult'  for them to create a new world record, Liu's coach  said.
Liu has not had a good season, losing  his world record to  Cuban hurdler Dayron Robles  in June.



Lingering heel injury hobbling star hurdler on eve of contest