Chinese diving in 'difficult situation'

BEIJING - After winning seven of the eight gold medals on offer at the FINA Diving World Series Beijing Sunday, Chinese diving team leader Zhou Jihong played down the success and said "the Chinese diving is in a difficult situation."

Young divers He Chao and Xie Siyi both missed the Beijing Series due to injury and Olympic champ Chen Ruolin also hurt her left arm accidentally before the competition. Chen still won the women's 10m platform synchronized Friday, but the absence of He and Xie made the Chinese team lose the men's 3m springboard gold as Lin Yue/Cao Yuan were platform specialists and seldom took part in springboard.

"We have been in a difficult situation since the London Olympics," Zhou said. "We have strong rivals in men's springboard and platform, and our advantage in synchronized events has been chipped away."

Zhou said that some platform divers should also practise in springboard as China was short of springboard divers currently.

Compared with the men's events, China still has some advantage in the women's.

"For the women's team, what we can do is to train hard and perform our best," Zhou said.