Romania’s Olympic champion David Popovici qualified for tonight’s men’s 200m freestyle final at the European Aquatics U23 Swimming Championships in sublime style, dominating his heat from the first stroke to clock the morning’s fastest time of 1:46.84. Having also won world and European titles, a European U23 gold would complete the 20-year-old’s set. Can he get it? Bulgaria’s 19-year-old 400m freestyle world junior record holder Petar Mitsin, second fastest on 1:46.99, could be his closest rival.

Meanwhile Popovici’s 21-year-old compatriot Denis-Laurean Popescu made a powerful opening statement that went down very well with Romanian supporters as he topped men’s 100m butterfly qualifying in an impressive 51.49 – 0.62 faster than the subsequent time of 52.11 set by Portugal’s 20-year-old double world champion Diogo Ribeiro. Interesting…

Hungary could be heading for a 1-2 in the women’s 200m freestyle, where their two 19-year-olds Nikolett Padar and Minna Abraham – born within a week of each other – were respective fastest qualifiers in 1:56.85 and 1:58.27.

Mike Rowbottom for European Aquatics