OFI chief confident Games will go ahead

THE Olympic Federation of Ireland remain steadfast in their belief that the Games will go ahead in Tokyo in July of this year, despite media reports claiming that the Japanese government now feel it wouldn’t be appropriate to stage them as Covid-19 numbers continue to rise in the country. Japan’s Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga said he was ‘determined’ to hold the Games this summer ‘as proof that mankind will have overcome the virus’. International Olympic Committee president Thomas Bach yesterday described reports that the Olympics would be scrapped as ‘fake news’, and Governor of Tokyo Yuriko Koike threatened to ‘file a protest’ about the story. In a strongly-worded statement released last night, the OFI echoed those sentiments. ‘Overnight media reports claimed incorrectly that a private decision had been made by the Government of Japan to cancel the Olympic Games,’ it read. ‘The Japanese government has stated categorically that this is not true. The Olympic Federation of Ireland has also been very clear on this subject in recent weeks. We remain fully of the view that the Games will go ahead in July this year.’ However, the OFI accepted that the Games will be unlike any previous Olympics. ‘We do feel that the Games will be very different, with stringent counter-measures in place to safeguard athletes.’ The IOC are going to provide an update next Wednesday as to where things stand with regard to staging the Olympics. World Athletics president Seb Coe yesterday said that there was a ‘laser focus’ on delivering the Games but conceded it is likely to be without fans. He said: ‘I would love to have fans, but if the only way is behind closed doors, everybody is accepting of that.’