Duplantis leads star cast at Doha Diamond League today

There are an array of stars who will be in action at the opening leg of the Diamond League at Qatar Sports Club today, but Armand Duplantis amid a mix of youth and world class talent will certainly hold the centre stage.At just 22, the Swede has owned the pole vault in the last couple of years and any competition he is in is worth watching because there’s a chance he might set a world record.Earlier this year, Duplantis pieced together one of the greatest indoor campaigns in history as he cleared six metres in all six of his competitions, improving with each meeting and breaking world records in Belgrade both before (6.19m) and during the World Indoor Championships (6.20m).Doha will be his outdoor opener and he’ll take on a field that includes five of the top six from Tokyo, highlighted by silver medallist Chris Nilsen of the US.Although Duplantis can seemingly vault six metres on any given day, no athlete has cleared that height at Doha’s outdoor track. But with maiden world championship title in his sights, the Olympic champion will be hoping he can start with a win in Doha, or may be even break his own world record.“As for the titles, you know I want the full range, it’s my main goal,” Duplantis said at a press conference at the 3-2-1 Qatar Olympic and Sports Museum yesterday.“It comes down to these really tiny margins so I’m just trying to get everything in the right place for when it comes to competing in the world championships to make sure that, when the bar is at that gold medal height, I’m on the right pole, right grip, right run,” he added.Seven individual gold medallists from last year’s Olympics, along with several other world champions and Olympic relay winners will be in action today in Doha with Dina Asher-Smith being one of them. The Brit has happy memories of Qatar, having won the 200m world title in 2019. However, her Olympic dreams were crushed last year in Tokyo due to injury.The Doha Diamond League will be her first 200m of the year. The 26-year-old has tested her form in some early low-key season races over 400m and 300m, clocking a PB of 36.41 in the latter. But this will be her biggest test of the season so far as she takes on Olympic 100m bronze medallist Shericka Jackson, Olympic 200m bronze medallist Gabby Thomas, sub-22-second performer Tamara Clark of the USA and in-form Bahamian Anthonique Strachan.“I’m hoping to go out there and perform really well. I think that’s the wisest thing to do early in the season. If you have expectations of time sometimes early on, you are not always fulfilled for reasons that are outside of your control,” Asher-Smith said yesterday.“The injury at the Olympics was a bit annoying because a few weeks later I was almost back in personal best shape. But it doesn’t really change anything about the form I was in or the amount of improvements I have made as an athlete since I was running in Doha in 2019. It will be fun to showcase the work that we’ve been putting in over the past three years,” she added.The highlight of the evening today is the men’s 200 metres where Olympic champion Andre De Grasse of Canada will compete against American world title holder Noah Lyles and world indoor 400m champion Jereem Richards. The loaded field also includes Olympic 100m silver medallist Fred Kerley, Olympic 4x100m champion Filippo Tortu, and Canadian duo Aaron Brown and Jerome Blake – winners at recent Continental Tour Gold meetings.The women’s 400m line-up features four of the top five women from the Tokyo Games – including Olympic champion Shaunae Miller-Uibo – but it also includes three women who earned gold medals in relay events in the Japanese capital.Miller-Uibo, who won the world indoor title two months ago, will take on Olympic silver medallist Marileidy Paulino, Jamaican duo Stephenie Ann McPherson and Candice McLeod, US pair Lynna Irby and Kendell Ellis and Poland’s Natalia Kaczmarek.In the men’s steeplechase, Tokyo Games gold medallist Soufiane El Bakkali renews his rivalry with world and Olympic silver medallist Lamecha Girma of Ethiopia, Olympic bronze medallist and Diamond League champion Benjamin Kigen, Ethiopia’s Getnet Wale, Eritrea’s Yemane Haileselassie and Kenya’s Abraham Kibiwot, winner at the recent Continental Tour Gold meeting in Nairobi.The women’s 3000m will be an enthralling meet-in-the-middle clash between Olympic 1500m champion Faith Kipyegon and Diamond League 5000m champion Francine Niyonsaba.