"with the pants ripped in the a**...

...and people are still expecting gold" this is what Nicolae Forminte answered when a reporter asked about his medals expectations. He knew that Russia was too good to be defeated and he had so many injury-related worries that he was entitled to expect the worst. Today, Russia was a good team, not at its best but close enough. Great Britain on the other hand, had a fantastic day.

But Romania...With Ana Porgras in tears because of the pains she was having after each dismount, with a really scared Raluca Haidu (injured as well) with a still shy but constant Amelia Racea and a slightly happier Diana Chelaru, Romania looked like a team crawling to the end of the meeting.

In my opinion, Ana Porgras shouldn't have been used for the uneven bars. Not even if this had costed Romania the bronze. If this bronze means breaking Ana Porgras, I really hate it and Forminte should hate it even more. But it's easy to speak and difficult to be the national team coordinator, the parent and Santa Claus for these girls. And after long months and years of hard work, pain, broken fingers and more pain, you want them to have the medal. Even if it's bronze. And maybe you think that sacrifying Ana Porgras is worth it. Even if it doesn't.

In the end, Romania did not lose today. The correct statement would be: Great Britain won silver.

I know, it's artistic gymnastics and those girls from Great Britain are anything but artistic. But they are tough. The moment they finished the beam rotation without a fall (and we all expected about 4-5 of them :P), they were as good as European champions for me. And they had Beth Tweddle with them. Her uneven bars set is bliss, her floor is horror, but she hits and has sky high D scores. What more could we ask from 25 year old gymnast?

And then there was Russia: they deserved the title, but their win was not by a safe margin. With a fairer score for Nabieva's Uneven bars and for all three Vauls, plus one fall from Semenova or Myzdiakova, and they would have lost to Great Britain. They area great, beautiful, great difficulty, but they need to work on consistency.

All in all, it was not a terrible day. Except for Ana Porgras's tears, that I will never forget and for which it will be hard to forgive Nicolae Forminte.

PS. photo by Ollie Williams. I found it in an interesting article on BBC Sports page