Japan national pride at stake in ‘mammoth call’
US Olympic Committee set to play decisive role in seismic task of moving the Olympics, writes Tom Cary
With USA Track and Field the latest to call for Tokyo 2020 to be postponed, it feels increasingly a question of when, not if, the International Olympic Committee will bow to the inevitable. The United States is by far the biggest and most influential stakeholder in the Olympic movement and, with its sports toppling like dominoes, it surely cannot be long before the US Olympic Committee officially declares for a postponement. When that happens, it is Games over.
The more pertinent question might be why, in the face of a global pandemic, has the IOC not already postponed? The answer, of course, is that calling off a modern Olympic Games is such a huge logistical and financial undertaking that organisers are understandably reluctant to do so unless absolutely necessary.
When you consider the money at stake – Japan alone is estimated to be spending north of £20billion on these Games – the insurance claims that would be triggered, the television adverts already sold, the selection dramas that would ensue, you begin to question whether it is even feasible.
And when would you postpone until? If you pushed the Games back a month or two, you might find coronavirus has not cleared up and you are forced to postpone again. You would also be plonking the biggest sporting event in the world straight into typhoon season. We all remember Hagibis at the Rugby World Cup last autumn.
Delay by 12 months? Not only would that involve having to move the 2021 World Athletics Championships, it would also likely mean a new round of selection trials. That in turn could lead to lawsuits from disgruntled athletes who had been selected for this year.
“It’s a mammoth call,” conceded Tim Crow, a sports marketing and sponsorship expert. “I understand why they’re trying to hold the fort. Why would you take a decision when there’s potentially the opportunity not to? But I think, increasingly, it’s one they’re going to have to take.”
It is going to be a seismic task. The television financials alone are mindboggling. NBC is estimated to have sold more than $1billion of adverts for the Tokyo Games, a figure often used to explain the IOC’s reluctance to make a decision. Crow, though, does not believe this is necessarily the problem it is made out to be. “The way TV advertising is sold is actually quite arcane,” he said. “Media buyers will buy a certain amount of ratings and don’t really care where they get them.
“Of course the Olympics is a ratings monster. But the interesting thing right now is that actually, around the world where the virus is hitting, ratings are up 10-20 per cent because everyone is at home watching TV. So it should be reasonably easy for substitutions to take place.
“The other thing is that many of the advertisers are actually sponsors in the Games, so that relationship isn’t really affected, as whenever the Games take place, they will be there.”
Venues are another big issue. Tokyo 2020 will comprise 33 competition venues, 11 of them built specifically for these Games. The IOC and the Tokyo 2020 committee do not own all of these facilities. In fact, some have other tenants and plans lined up beyond the Games, including the Olympic Village itself, which is to be converted into condominiums, many of which have already been sold.
Again, though, if Tokyo is serious about postponing, it is difficult to imagine a few landlords standing in the way. Public pressure to be accommodating would be enormous. Japan’s national pride is at stake, “a cultural nuance I think people underestimate,” Crow said. “People will be moving mountains to make it happen.”
There would, of course, be millions of dollars lost in air fares and hotel rooms this summer and the question of who picks up the tab for that would be contentious. “What’s in your force majeure clause? That’s a conversation I’ve had a hundred times in the last week,” Crow said.
But where there is a will there is a way. “A lot of the logistical issues were probably moot anyway,” he added. “Hospitality and sponsorship programmes, for instance, were already looking impractical because of the travel bans in place. I suspect a lot of the people at the sharp end of that [industry] would actually be pretty relieved if they can press pause and start on something which has 21 on the end of it rather than 20.
“There will be a huge cost, of course there will. Sport is a giant joint venture and the Olympics is as big as it gets. It has so many stakeholders. But I think it can be done.
“The sense I am getting now is that postponement is pretty much inevitable. But what I am also getting is the sense that people are being collaborative and constructive, and that is what is going to be needed if solutions are to be found.”