With the likes of fellow youngsters Toby Flood, Ryan Lamb and Shane Geraghty, and veterans Jonny Wilkinson and Charlie Hodgson, all likely to be in the mix for 2011, it has been the 20-year-old Cipriani who has been hogging the headlines.

He produced a thrilling first-half performance in Wasps’ 25-24 win over Clermont in the European Cup, his pace and eye for an outside break laying the bedrock for the win.

His youth shone through in the second-half, however, when he spurned a clear overlap that would have led to a sure try, missed important but kickable goals and his percentage plays were lacking the accuracy of someone more experienced.

“In the second half against Clermont Auvergne he displayed some fallibility,” admitted former England and British Lions outside-half Stuart Barnes.

“His first half was unbelievably audacious. Speed of leg, speed of mind, subtle kicking and sweeping swerves combined to leave yours truly gasping in smiling bewilderment in the press box.”

Barnes called on England coach Brian Ashton to give Cipriani his chance at international level, as Clive Woodward did to Wilkinson, and that could come in this season’s Six Nations.

“However, that early blooding enabled him (Wilkinson) to mature at a startling rate of knots into one of the best fly-halves of the decade and a key man in the rise of England to the top of the world.

“The Wasps fly-half has plenty of work to do both with his kicking and his tackling but with England in desperate need of some attacking inspiration it seems that Wilkinson’s future is being threatened by the next generation of fly-half.”

SWIMMING

CATE CAMPBELL (Australia)

Fifteen-year-old Cate Campbell has been making waves in Australian women’s swimming ahead of the Beijing Olympics.

The lanky 1.81 metre teenager from Indooroopilly, Brisbane is the fastest swimmer for her age in the world after breaking through in 2007.

Campbell has emerged as Australia’s latest sprint sensation in an era which has seen the likes of Libby Lenton, Jodie Henry and Alice Mills.

She beat world champion Lenton to win the 50m freestyle at the International Swim Meet in Japan in August where she set the third fastest time ever.

And her coach Simon Cusack believes there will be some nerves among Olympic champions Lenton, Mills and Henry ahead of the trials for the Beijing Games.

The eldest of five children, Campbell and her family moved to Australia from Malawi when she was nine because they needed better treatment for her handicapped brother.

She accidentally stumbled into swimming a year later when she visited a local Brisbane pool hoping to make a few friends.

And her achievements are more impressive as she had to overcome hip surgery after she suffered an injury playing handball last year.

The recurring injury harms her training for the 100m where her best time of 54.70sec is still short of Lenton’s 53.40.

ATHLETICS

HUANG HAIQAING (China)

Back in 1984, the three-time world record breaking high jumper Zhu Jianhua became the first Chinese athlete to win an Olympic medal and Huang Haiqaing hopes to follow in his footsteps in Beijing next summer.

Huang, who turns 20 on February 8, is the reigning world junior high jump champion and has been the world’s top teenager in the discipline for the last two years.

The difference between Huang and many of the world’s other top junior athletes, including China’s Xue Fei who is the reigning junior women’s 5,000m champion, is that he is already a world class competitor at senior level.

Last summer, he cleared 2.30m to rank 13th in the world and, with a personal best of 2.32m from 2006 which he cleared to win the world junior title, many pundits believe he has a shot at the medals at the Beijing Games.

If Huang doesn’t succeed on home soil then he already has other ambitions, not least breaking Zhu’s Asian, and former world, record of 2.39m which has been on the continental standard for more than 23 years.

“I may not have reached that level by the time Beijing stages the Olympics but I think I will be able to at least challenge for a medal there,” said Huang.

“And I think I can beat his record in two or three years, that’s my ultimate target.”

Huang has been inspired by the adulation and financial rewards that came the way of China’s 2004 Olympic 110m hurdles champion Liu Xiang, who is also the world record holder and reigning world champion at his event.

Liu was a promising teenage high jumper before being told by his coach that he would not succeed at the event and encouraged to concentrate on the hurdles. Curiously, Huang had the reverse experience. He was a more-than-useful hurdler but was told by his coach to stick with the high jump. —AFP