Gérard Rousselle, the meeting director of the Meeting Gaz de France, the second leg of the IAAF Golden League 2007, will be playing the numbers game on Friday night (5). The big number is 60,000, the paying customers who will be turning out at the Stade de France in St Denis for the event, making it far and away the best attended meeting on the Golden League circuit.

The smaller number is 5 - that’s the number of athletes who Rousselle believes will still be in contention for a share of the $1 million jackpot on offer to undefeated competitors by the time the Golden League reaches Berlin in September.

“We are hoping for 60,000 tomorrow night. The weather forecast is for sun, no rain, if a little bit cold for July,” said Rousselle, in his Paris office, putting the finishing touches to the arrangements. “It is a great crowd to have in the Stade de France - perhaps not a record, we have had 72,000 before, but it is a good number for a track and field meeting.”

Rousselle explains that ticket prices are deliberately kept low - just 30 euro for the best seats in the stadium, provided the tickets are bought before the start of June. “We might have sold more, but there was a presidential election, and maybe people did not want to spend any money for a while,” he says.

Rousselle believes that part of the reason that so many Parisians are turning out for the city’s biggest annual night of athletics is the number of key events which feature French favourites.

“I am probably looking forward to two events more than any others,” he says. “The men’s 110 metres Hurdles, which has a great field, and which includes Ladji Doucouré, and the 1500m, with Mehdi Baala, two Frenchmen who will get the crowd really excited, especially Baala, the crowds love to see him race.”

Baala is unbeaten at 1500m since the Paris meet last season, and he goes in a Golden League event which is shorn of its Oslo victor: Adil Kaouch, of Morocco, the Dream Mile winner.

Kaouch is one of four Oslo winners absent in Paris, with Jamaica’s 100m World record holder Asafa Powell perhaps the most disappointing withdrawal, through injury, late on Monday.

But Rousselle believes that sprint hurdler, Anwar Moore, will be the Golden League contender under greatest threat in Paris, where as well as Doucouré, the field also includes World record holder Liu Xiang, from China.

“We also have a very strong contingent of Americans coming over straight from Indianapolis, including Torri Edwards, Angelo Taylor and James Carter in the 400m Hurdles, Sanya Richards and the three girls in the 100m Hurdles - Michelle Perry, Virginia Powell and Lolo Jones.

“But I am not expecting any surprises in the other Golden League events. The Oslo winners like Tero Pitkämäki, Richards, and the Russians Yelena Slesarenko in the High Jump and Yelena Isinbayeva in the Pole Vault are all expected to win again here.

“Only Moore, in the men’s Hurdles, is under real pressure. He was perhaps a bit of a surprise winner in Oslo, and here we have a field that is of the highest quality.”

Rousselle has put together several other match-up events between top French athletes and the Americans, which he anticipates will be crowd pleasers. His only regret has been the late withdrawal of some Ethiopian runners, most notably Tariku Bekele, because his national federation has re-routed him to compete in the African Championships.

“But even so,” Rousselle says, “I expect there to be plenty for the big crowd to make some big noise.”

Steven Downes for the IAAF
With acknowledgements to Alain Mercier for translation work