Paris Olympics: fencing champion Cheung Ka-long will have target on his back in France, Hong Kong coach says
- As the reigning Olympic and Asian Games champion, Cheung Ka-long is the one fencers will all want to beat in France
- The 27-year-old has three events before Paris, and will train at a local club in the French city to complete preparations for this year’s Games
Olympic champion fencer Cheung Ka-long is better than when he won gold in Tokyo, but has been warned he will have a target on his back at this summer’s Paris Games.
Hong Kong foil head coach Gregory Koenig said Cheung was “stronger in every aspect of his performance”, but said the 26-year-old’s title defence would be more complicated than three years ago.
And Koenig has implemented a series of measures to try to alleviate the pressure on his star athlete.
“He will go to these Games with a different status, and [rivals] thinking, ‘I want to defeat the Olympic champion’,” Koenig said. “Before, he was the underdog, nobody was waiting for him. When you are the Olympic champion you have the maximum pressure, and we have to see how he will handle it.
“He is strong enough, technically, tactically, and physically, so the only thing remaining is the psychological aspect. I am confident he can reproduce what he did in Tokyo, but fencing is unpredictable. It is not like swimming or running, where you fight against the time, we have a [direct] opponent.”
Cheung, Daphne Chan, the Asian Games women’s foil bronze medallist, and Cedric Ho Wai-hang, will form a skeleton Hong Kong fencing squad in France.