London 2012 Olympics: Godfrey keeps South Koreans in his sights with personal best

Godfrey, the world No 10, shot the fourth best score of the 72-arrow event to lay down a strong marker ahead of the individual competition.

He scored 680, finishing behind only South Korea’s dominant three-man team. Im Dong-hyun – who is registered as blind, but whose 699 was the first world record of the Games – took top seeding, with Kim Bubmin’s 698 leaving him second and Oh Jin-hyek’s 690 good enough for third.

Bristol-based Godfrey was more than happy with his own score though, finishing four points in front of world  No 1 Brady Elliso of the United States, who was left in 10th. Cumbrian Alan Wills was ranked 42nd with 660 and Leicestershire’s Simon Terry was 50th out of 64 competitors with 654.

That leaves them ranked eighth out of 12 teams, with the men’s medal matches taking place tomorrow.

Great Britain’s path is a tough one, with Ukraine first up followed by a match against the rampant South Koreans should they win.

Godfrey was nevertheless delighted with his day’s work.

“I’m very happy with a personal best,” he said. “The British record was on, it was in sight, and I let it go towards the end but I am happy.

“I thought I would have been a bit lower than fourth. But this is what I’ve been training for – to peak and shoot as well as I can at an Olympic qualifier. I have a lot of confidence in myself and the weather held up. It was a great day for shooting.

“Anyone has a chance of a medal tomorrow. We just have to bring what we’ve got and see what happens.

“It’s about going back and resting now, repeating what I did yesterday then wake up tomorrow and kick some ass.”

It was a disappointing ranking round for Great Britain’s women, meanwhile. With 64 female archers shooting 72  arrows apiece to earn their seedings for the individual and team events, Naomi Folkard was Team GB’s highest-ranked participant in 42nd place.

The Kidderminster-based 28-year-old scored 637 from a maximum 720, with six-time Olympian Alison Williamson in 47th place after scoring 629 and Amy Oliver placing 57th with a total of 608. The pacesetters were South Korean duo Bo Bae Ki and Ya-Ting Tan of Chinese Taipei who were tied on 671 points.

With a combined total of 1874 from 216 arrows, Great Britain were seeded 11th out of 12 nations in the team event.

The knockout stages of that event are next for the trio tomorrow, when they face Russia in the round of 16.

That will be viewed as a winnable match but their quarter-final opponents would then be third seeds Chinese Taipei, who placed third and received a bye to the last eight.

As well as meeting Russia in the team event, Folkard will line up against Russian Kristina Timofeeva and in the singles and is content with her frame of mind ahead of those matches.

“The score maybe wasn’t ideal, so I’m a bit disappointed with that, but I kept going through the right mental processes and I’m pleased with the way I shot,” she said. “There were just a couple of ends where my group wasn’t good enough. I have a day tomorrow to work on it then we go again in the team event.

“You have to be confident going into the head-to-heads and if you’re feeling good that’s going to give you more confidence. Feeling good (about my game), for me, gives more confidence than just a good score.

“I know I’m shooting really well, I just have to put it all together.”