Anju qualifies for long jump final

Anju Bobby George accomplished the first half of her mission at the Olympic Games by leaping into the women's long jump final with her very first jump in Athens on Wednesday night.

The 27 year-old World Athletics Championship bronze medallist cleared 6.69 metres in her very first attempt. The automatic qualification mark was 6.65m.

Anju thus became only the second Indian woman athlete to figure in an Olympic final after another Kerala legend, P T Usha.

Usha had achieved the distinction in the 400m hurdles in the 1984 Los Angeles Games before narrowly missing out on a bronze medal by one-hundredths of a second.

Usha, a columnist for rediff.com, is also in Athens currently to watch the Olympiad.

The others who qualified automatically were:

Tatyana Lebedeva (Rus) 6.95

Bronwyn Thompson (Aus) 6.80

Tatyana Kotova (Rus) 6.79

Irina Simagina (Rus) 6.75

Carolina Kluft (Swe) 6.73

Jade Johnson (GBR) 6.71

Marion Jones (USA) 6.70

Bianca Kappler (Ger) 6.69

Grace Upshaw (USA) 6.68

Yelena Kashcheyeva (Kaz) 6.57 and Tunde Vaszi (Hun) 6.55 qualified as best losers.