大象传媒

Margins in archery are as miniscule as they come. Sometimes the difference between scoring a 10 or a 9 is a matter of millimetres between one side of the line and the other.

And that one point can make all the difference in the outcome of a match, the destination of a championship and - every four years - even Olympic selection.

Take last week, for instance, at the , at Vittel in France.

It was great that Naomi Folkard won the women's recurve silver medal - she works extremely hard and deserves it, and it will be a big boost to her confidence.

But she was the only British medal winner, and a casual observer might ask why, and what might we read into that.

Well, read nothing into it - our archers headed home knowing that, in reality, they didn't do badly at all. And by the way, I'm not saying all this as an apologist, but as someone who might be able to explain archery's wafer-thin line between a medal, and an early elimination.

Take Naomi's colleagues in the women's recurve tournament.

Alison Williamson reached the last last 16 and only out lost in a sudden death shoot-off against Berengere Schuh, who eventually beat Naomi in the final.

In the previous round, it was Charlotte Burgess who missed out against Schuh, and indeed, she was leading at one stage in the match. But one bad arrow ultimately cost her the match.

To make some kind of analogy, in cricket a Test batsman can be playing a fantastic innings, only to play one rogue shot - one momentary lack of concentration for whatever reason - and be heading back to the pavillion.

At some levels that batsman might actually get away with it, but Test-match level is unforgiving. It's no different in international archery, where one arrow can let you down.

In the men's recurve championship, none of the lads made it past the last 16, but shot 113 from 12 arrows in his second round match, which is a great score by any standards.

He finished the match tied with Baljini Tsyrempilov - last year's World Cup Grand Final gold medalist, and the gold medal winner too in Vittel - only to lose the shoot-off.

In any other second-round match, Alan would have gone through, and he was just unlucky that he met such a top-class opponent at an earlier stage of the head-to-heads than he would have hoped for.

Larry Godfrey lost to the eventual silver medalist, while Michael Peart will have gained from the experience of this tournament.

But what is really encouraging is that British archers are being extremely competitive at every event they are going to.

As Hilda Gibson, the team manager told me: "We are not just going to these events to compete, we are going to them to get to finals - all our archers are qualifying in the top 32, and essentially it's now all about that fine tuning, and seeking the final edge."

While it is always nice to win medals, I have no doubt that any of our archers would pass on a European Championship medal if it meant securing a place at the Olympic Games.

They now have a couple of weeks to step up their preparations for two Olympic shoots, with the final taking place at Lilleshall, the headquarters of Archery GB, on 18 and 19 June.

After that we will know , will be heading off to Beijing.

The moment of truth is dawning!