Cate Campbell says her infamous “sore losers” remark about the USA swimming team was not intended to be disrespectful, but the four-time Olympian encouraged her American rivals not to see themselves as the centre of the sporting universe – and to better understand Australian humour.
“For goodness sake, when they have their baseball championships, they call it the World Series when it’s just America . When they’re the Super Bowl champions, they say they’re the champions of the world. You’re the champions of America.” American breaststroker Lilly King tweeted shortly after: “Sorry we aren’t so uptight we can’t cheer for our teammates as they walkout for events. See you in Paris.”
“By any stretch of the imagination, you can say that Australia came out of those world championships as the best team in the world. They had the most number of gold medals. We broke five world records and I still stand by the fact that I think that Australia was the best swimming team in the world.