Olympic silver medallist calls for ‘accountability’

Great Britain’s Amber Rutter says “accountability needs to be taken” following the women’s Skeet final at the Paris Olympic Games (News, 14 August). 

Amber took the silver medal after being judged to have missed a shot in the shoot-off and the 26-year-old has now asked for an apology over the error. The shooting equivalent of video assistant referee (VAR) is not in place at the Olympics and the judges were unable to overturn their decision. 

Amber said on social media that a “poor and incorrect decision by all three referees” had cost her the chance of competing for the gold medal. She also highlighted the fact that VAR is in place in International Shooting Sport Federation (ISSF) competitions and called for a “fair playing field” for Olympic athletes. 

“I can’t imagine much will be done, and that is not what I am looking for,” she said. “But I do believe some accountability needs to be taken to acknowledge and apologise… and a plan to prevent something like this happening again.” 

British Shooting, the national governing body for Olympic sport, said: “We have raised our concerns with the the ISSF, and we expect to learn more about potential solutions at the next committee meeting.” 

The ISSF told ST it is “analysing a number of options to introduce and test new technolgies to help judges in shotgun events”.