Is this year Matthew Denny's year?

Winner of the Diamond League final in 2023, winner of the Commonwealth Games in 2022 and he finished last year beating the biggest. In Australia they are hoping for Matthew Denny. 

If you start in Brisbane and drive 90 minutes west you will arrive in Toowoomba. To the public, it is perhaps best known for its gardens and its university. This is where Matthew Denny was born, one of the world's best discus throwers. 

Already as a junior, Denny excels when he wins Youth World Championship gold and comes fourth at Junior World Championship. When Daniel Ståhl takes gold in Doha, 23-year-old Denny makes his first World Championship. He finishes sixth in the final in 65.43, just over meters from a medal. 

Two years later, he is in the final again. While Sweden celebrates two Olympic medals in Tokyo, Denny finishes in bitter fourth place, only five centimeters from a bronze medal. 

The following year, Denny again finishes sixth at the World Championships, but he gets vindication when he throws home his first gold at the Commonwealth Games in Birmingham. The winning throw measures 67.26 and is then one of the longest throws ever by an Australian. 

At the World Championship 2023, he therefore comes as an outsider to the medals and in the final he strikes with a new personal best, 68.24. A result that had been enough for a medal in the last seven championships, but not this time. Instead, Denny once again finishes in the bitter fourth place, half a meter from a medal. 

Denny's season could also have ended here, but then it was the Diamond League final in Eugene. With his last throw, Denny evicts the discus over the 68 meter line, it lands at 68.43. He takes home the victory and beats both Daniel Ståhl and Kristian Ceh, the gold and silver medalist from the World Championship a month earlier. 

2024 has started at the same pace and already in April he threw 69.35, the longest throw ever by an Australian. Denny comes to Stockholm on the second of June to meet, among others, Daniel Ståhl, Mykolas Alekna, Andrius Gudzius and Simon Petterson. Is 2024 the year he gets to step on the podium? At the stadium, we'll at least get a hint if it's possible.