So near and yet so far for Charter

ANDREW CHARTER is a man conflicted. He’s buzzing with excitement and enthusiasm as the Kookaburras chase Olympic Games glory, but on the inside, he’s an absolute mess.
If you thought having the pressure of being an Olympic gold medal favourite was hard, try being separated from your teammates by a fence.
That’s right, a fence that the Australian reserve goalkeeper could probably jump over if he wanted, but he knows he can’t.
As one of the reserves in the hockey squad, Charter can only play at the Olympics if first-choice goalkeeper Nathan Burgers is injured.
He was in the Olympic village when the team first arrived, but was booted out earlier this week.
Now he’s staying in a hotel just 10 metres away, but for the 25-year-old it’s a nightmare.
‘‘It’s unique I guess ... the first stage is arriving and getting slightly different gear to everyone else, that was confronting,’’ Charter said as he watched the Kookaburras in their final practice match.
‘‘The next stage is waiting for the first game, that’s when it will hit home. I’ve still got a job to do, so I can’t mope around ... we still feel a part of team but there is another level of segregation.
‘‘But it makes me look at the Rio Games in 2016, I’ve caught the Olympic bug and for the first time in my career I’m looking ahead into the future and wanting to be there and actually play at a Games.’’
It’s a truly unique situation. Both the soccer and water polo teams can carry extended squads and they can rotate players in and out of the main team. But Charter has to wait for an injury, and he doesn’t wish that upon his teammates.
The Kookaburras open their gold medal bid against South Africa tomorrow.
They are ranked No. 1 in the world and their toughest competition will come from Germany.
Ric Charlesworth’s team dominated Germany in a warm-up match before the opening ceremony, before stumbling and having to settle for a 2-2 draw.
Goulburn’s Glenn Turner has been in outstanding form on the Olympic arena.
In his three practice matches he has scored three goals.
‘‘Hopefully this type of form continues. [It] would be great to get a goal in every game and I can’t wait for the stands to be full,’’ Turner said.
‘‘But I don’t want to get too excited with the hype and buzz because we’ve got to perform in all of our games.
‘‘We’ve had some chats about the pressure of being No. 1 for the past couple of years now.
‘‘We want to go well and I want to enjoy it, too ... but I probably won’t look back on it as an experience until it’s over.’’
Turner isn’t nervous ahead of the opening match ‘‘because if we make a mistake we’ve got 70 minutes to make up for it’’.
And his biggest concern has nothing to do with the Olympics, it’s keeping track of South Sydney’s progress in the NRL and its progress on the way to the finals.
‘‘We can’t watch any of the games so I’m itching to find out how they go. We might have to pick up some sort of feed on the internet where we can see the performances,’’ he said.