Why doesn't the crowd favourite win gymnastics?

Gymnastics is a strange sport, at least for the audiences, as the crowd favourite never ends up in the winning side.

A top official in the sport tried to explain why the judges scoring system never matches with the spectators' expectations.

It is a common occurrence in Rhythmic Gymnastics that a performance rated favourite by the crowds fails to secure a medal because crowd perception differs from that of the judges.

Canadian Slava Corn, vice-president of the Federation International de Gymnastique, said the same things happen in diving and synchronised swimming, where the crowd favourite ends up on the losing side most of the times.

She is also in favour of giving the audiences some sort of a say in the final vote.

"Sometimes I think the audience should judge. They can have a difficult time understanding why their favourite performance didn't win.

"The audience can be captured by a gymnast's charisma and can recognise the difficulty of a move. If a gymnast throws the hoop in the air and does a double roll before catching it, they see that and can appreciate that, but the sport is so complex from a judging point of view," Corn said.

In Rhythmic Gymnastics, judges rate a performance on three criteria -- difficulty, execution and artistic presentation.

Unlike Artistic Gymnastics, in which the focus is on strength and endurance on fixed apparatus, Rhythmic Gymnastics places more emphasis on flexibility and the manipulation of the apparatus -- rope, hoop, ball, clubs or ribbon.

These characteristics influence how each apparatus is judged, and the complexities of the sport and the judging mean the majority of spectators are unaware of why one performance scores higher than another.

Father-son duo avoid clash in Rugby

The Rugby Sevens at the 2010 Commonwealth Games in Delhi saw a father-son combination with a difference.

Tomasi Cama Jr was representing title favourites, New Zealand, but his father Cama was coaching the inexperienced Malaysians.

Cama Jr admitted that he was it was good that the duo didn't have to face off against each other.

"I suppose he'll be up in the stands watching me now," he said. "I'm glad we avoided playing them."