French Still in Front as Series Arrives in Falsterbo

The defending champions from France still hold the whip hand as the 2010 Meydan FEI Nations Cup™ series moves to Falsterbo in Sweden this Friday. Full of flair and confidence they blazed a trail through the first-half of the season with a spectacular hat-trick of wins, and they hold an eight-point lead over Great Britain in second place going into the last four rounds of the eight-leg series.

After a superb victory from the all-girl team in Rotterdam three weeks ago the USA has improved to third with just 3.5 points separating them from the British, while Germany lies fourth, just 0.5 points further adrift. The Spanish team, newcomers to this top level of team jumping, have shown themselves more than equal to the task and in fifth place hold a single-point advantage over the Irish in sixth. But neither of these nations can afford to rest on their laurels.

VITALLY IMPORTANT

The last four teams on the league table at season’s end will be relegated to the Promotional League for 2011, so it is vitally important to stay ahead of the Swiss in seventh and the Dutch in eighth place. For Sweden however the moment of reckoning has very definitely arrived. This week’s host nation has picked up only two points so far and new Chef d’Equipe, Gosta Asker, will be asking his side to dig deep in order to rescue the situation. A win, or at the very least a top-three finish, is required to breathe some life into the Swedish effort and he has already assigned the task to four of his key players – Olympic silver medallist Rolf-Goran Bengtsson, Peder Fredriksson, Erika Lickhammer and Svante Johansson – while keeping his options open about who will fill the role of fifth-man, or woman, until later in the week.

Still holding on to last place on the leaderboard is the team from Poland who, guided by Chef d’Equipe Rudiger Wassibauer, have put up such a spirited fight from the outset but who have failed to pick up a single point so far. The goodwill they have engendered through their courageous and sportsmanship however is something money cannot buy. They have flown their national flag with dignity and distinction, sometimes missing out on the closing stages by the smallest of margins, and there would be few begrudgers if Jacek Bobik, Dawid Kubiak, Dawid Rakoczy and Piotr Sawicki were to steal some of the limelight this week.

EARNED HIS STRIPES

US team manager, George Morris, has a line-up that includes McLain Ward, Rich Fellers, Robert Kraut, Todd Minikus and Cara Raether. Kraut is new to the European scene and earned his stripes with some strong results in the US selection trials. Britain sends out Tina Fletcher who was just pipped in a two-way jump-off for the Hickstead Derby Trophy two weeks ago, and she is joined by Mark Armstrong, William Funnell, Gemma Paternoster and Tim Stockdale.

There is a family feel to the German selection as 28 year old Johannes Ehning is listed alongside older brother Marcus, Philipp Weishaupt, Alois Pollmann-Schweckhorst and Jorg Naeve, while the French look ferociously competitive with Nicolas Delmotte, Stephan Lafouge, Eric Navet, Kevin Staut and Marie Etter Pellegrin on call. Marie is married to Swiss team rider Daniel Etter but there is no danger of any family rivalry this week as Danny is not amongst Switzerland’s selection of Arthur da Silva, Claudia Gisler, Pius Schwizer and Hansueli and Janika Sprunger.

THE RIGHT DIRECTION

Manuel Suarez, Fernando Fourcade, Ricardo Jurado, Rutherford Latham and Pascal Levy are on call-up for Spanish team manager Marco Fuste while Holland’s Rob Ehrens will be hoping that Leopold van Asten, Marc Houtzager, Kevin Olsmeyer, Eric van der Vleuten and Jur Vrieling can at last turn Dutch fortunes in the right direction. It seems remarkable that both the reigning European and World championship teams – Switzerland and The Netherlands – are struggling to climb out of the relegation zone in the Meydan FEI Nations Cup™ this season, and the Dutch, for sure, must be due some luck fairly soon.

Meanwhile Ireland’s Robert Splaine will be expecting a more impressive result from his side that has not changed since they had to settle for equal-seventh in Rotterdam. Shane Breen, Jessica Kuerten, Dermott Lennon, Denis Lynch and Capt David O’Brien will be determined to ensure that Ireland does not slip into the bottom-four relegation group at this crucial stage of the eight-leg series which will conclude at their home event in Dublin in just four weeks time. This final half of the 2010 Meydan FEI Nations Cup™ is a testing one, with Aachen, Germany coming up less than a week after Falsterbo finishes, then just a two-week break to the penultimate leg in Hickstead (GBR) and Dublin bringing it all to an end another week later.

For further information on the fixture at Falsterbo go to website www.falsterbohorseshow.com or email Press Officer Malin Fredriksson at press@falsterbohorseshow.se or secretaryoffice@falsterbohorseshow.se – Telephone +46 40 473463.

2010 MEYDAN FEI NATIONS CUP™ – STANDINGS AFTER ROUND 4 IN ROTTERDAM:

1. France – 33.5

2. Great Britain – 25.5

3. USA – 22.0

4. Germany – 21.5

5. Spain – 16.0

6. Ireland – 15.0

7. Switzerland – 9.5

8. The Netherlands – 7.0

9. Sweden – 2.0

10. Poland – 0.0

Facts and Figures:

– Falsterbo Horse Show presents the fifth leg of the 2010 Meydan FEI Nations Cup™

– The Irish team were the winners at the Swedish fixture in 2009

– Falsterbo is located at the south-western tip of Sweden.

– Its lovely beaches and friendly atmosphere combine to make it a popular holiday destination for Swedish families.

– The Falsterbo Peninsula is also popular with bird-watchers who come to view the many migrating flocks that stop over en route to varying destinations.

– Show Director at Falsterbo Horse Show is former Swedish international show jumping star Jan Olaf Wannius.