Farah accused of second assault

A gym employee at a hotel in Ethiopia accused Mo Farah of grabbing him by the neck and shoving him, a second allegation of assault that emerged following an extraordinary public feud between the fourtime Olympic champion and retired distance-running great Haile Gebrselassie.

Chala Diriba, a gym instructor who works at the Yaya Village hotel owned by Gebrselassie, told The Associated Press the assault happened a year ago on one of the British runner’s training trips to the East African country.

Diriba said Farah was angry after accusing the instructor of copying one of his training regimes.

Gebrselassie, a two-time Olympic champion from Ethiopia, has claimed that Farah also assaulted two athletes, a man and his wife, on a separate visit to the same hotel this year. Farah’s representatives say he was the victim of ‘‘threatening behaviour’’ without giving more details of the incident. They said Gebrselassie was not present during the incident.

In a Times report yesterday, Gary Lough, Farah’s coach, claimed last month’s dispute arose because an Ethiopian was copying Farah’s weights programme in the gym. After asking him not to, another man came striding over to Bashir Abdi, Farah’s training partner.

‘‘He looked like he was going to attack Bashir,’’ Lough claimed. ‘‘Mo went to defend Bashir and they got into a bit of an altercation. Then the wife came running at Mo. He had his back to her and when he turned around she got hit on the arm. It was purely accidental. Then she is picking up dumbbells and threatening to throw them at him. I’m screaming at her to put those things down.’’

Lough said the woman represented the police at athletics so they were called and the couple made threats against him and Farah.

‘‘The police took them very seriously and it went to the head of the police region. They were told if they came anywhere near us they would be arrested. It was all resolved, it was all good.’’

Farah’s representatives declined to comment on the other alleged assault last year.

The squabble between Farah and Gebrselassie became public this week when Farah said he had £2500 (NZ$4900), two cellphones and a Tag Heuer watch his wife had bought him as a wedding anniversary present, stolen while staying at Gebrselassie’s hotel last month and the hotel ‘‘never took responsibility.’’

That led Gebrselassie to detail what he called Farah’s ‘‘disgraceful conduct’’ while staying at his hotel.

Farah completed the Olympic 5000m-10,000m double in 2012 and repeated it in 2016.