Huffington Post — In late July Goldman Sachs published a report in which it predicted the number of medals each country would win. The report, based on data such as each country’s growth, income per capita, population size and how it has fared in past Games, proved way off the mark in the case of Greece.
Despite falling in the “zero medals” category in the report, Greece returned home with six medals, three of them gold, and ranked 26th in the list of medal-winning countries.
Greece has been struggling with its deepening crisis for the past seven years, and with economic recession and surging unemployment affecting all aspects of life, the former host of the 2004 Games was forced to stop all funding of its Olympic athletes in 2009.
As a result, Greece did not win any gold medals in the 2008 or 2012 Games, and the prospects for Rio didn’t seem notably better, with athletes having to fend for themselves, hunting for last-minute sponsorships with no state backing.
