Other challengers for TF gold

I do expect USA to clinch TF gold but I can't say I would be devastated if they didn't. Dissapointed obviously as they really have the most potential by far and such great depth of athletes compared to other countries BUT as my country is not a contender at all, not having patriotic ties sure helps!

Now I really don't think Russia can take that gold from US. Komova appears stronger and better able to contend than she was last year. I also love the fact she appears much healthier looking and lost the waif look, yay! Mustafina, great to see her back. I would say she will have regained almost all of her previous difficulty by now, but she has lost the sharpness. Her twisting ability while never perfect, has deteriorated badly. Ponor on the other hand improved hers, so all is not yet lost for Aliya, I wouldn't count out a big improvement there but she will still be hurt from floor scoring and vault. If she competes an amanar I will cry. She was never able to land it perfectly, her legs were always locked and dodgy looking so the ACL wasn't a big surprise. But the pressure is on with USA fielding 5 amanars (this is using MY team of Wieber, Raisman, Ross, Douglas, Maroney. AND another with Price as alternate). Komova could have it beautiful in the air however and really help scoring. Bars of course a HUGE strong point. Floor is a little bit weaker. Grishina's is amazing, Komova and Musty at this point do not appear able to really outscore US on this, but we'll see.

Loving Romania's comback from basically nothing! It was great to see them victorious at Euro's. Hopefully that means they can really motivate themselves against an improved Russia and the dominant US in London. I see them fighting spectacularly for silver with Russia, couldn't call a winner at this point! Iordache is just fantastic, love her energetic and difficult floor- that double double looks great. Isbaza looks in great shape with lovely routines and Ponor's beam is spectacular. Her floor has improved, but I doubt they'd use her in TF on it. They will get high scores on floor and beam. their lacklustre to say the least bars and uncertain amount of Amanars/great DTY's might pull them down.

After such an amazing TF in 2008, China have lost their sparkle. They still obviously have strong points but it all looks a bit scrappy and as if they won't complement each other near as much as the 2008 team did. Beam and bars will no doubt be beautiful but other events just do not look as if they have high scoring potential. Which is a great shame after such a phenomenal performance but hey, they might pull a few surprises out of the bag.

I am devastated Ukraine will not field a team. United Kingdom on the other hand may well be able to place better than 5th. Hannah Whelan and Rebecca Tunney in particular are very strong competitiors, Pinches, Tweddle and Francis also looking very well. Tweddle's bar routine is astonishingly difficult, yet she seems to be hurt with her execution score. Hopefully she can tidy it up because if anyone deserves EF gold on bars, it's her.