THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
ZAKOPANE, Poland — Slovenia surprisingly won a ski jumping World Cup team event on Friday, capitalizing on a late mistake by host Poland and sub-par performances from the usual favourites.
The Polish team led for most of the competition until Krzysztof Mietus had a disappointing second jump in the penultimate round. The Slovenian team of Yurij Tepes, Robert Kranjec, Yaka Hvala and Peter Prevc took full advantage, finishing with 963.5 points for the victory. Poland was second with 954.4, while favourite Austria came third with 931.1 points.
Austria was without Gregor Schlierenzauer, the overall World Cup leader and Four Hills champion, who has a cold.
Austria still leads the Cup of Nations with 2,850 points, while Germany is second on 2,626 and Norway is third with 2,352. The Norwegians had a disappointing day and only finished seventh after Tom Hilde struggled with his second jump and only managed 90 metres on the large hill.