The male and female flagbearers who will make history at opening ceremony
Athletes of both genders will represent their country, while rower becomes first British Muslim to carry flag
OLYMPIC history will be made tonight when, in a break with tradition, one female and one male athlete get to carry their country’s respective flags at the opening ceremony to a Games.
But Team GB will go a step further, with the rower, Mohamed Sbihi, set to become the first British Muslim to carry the Union flag at an Olympic opening ceremony.
Sbihi, 33, was named by the British Olympic Association yesterday alongside Hannah Mills, the Cardiff-born sailor. They may look a little like the odd couple, though, with the 6ft 8in Sbihi towering above the 5ft 2in Mills, especially after it was revealed yesterday they would have to share one flag.
But Sbihi’s selection for the role at such a politically and racially charged Games will be seen as symbolic for a GB team thought to be among the most diverse ever sent to the Olympics. A Team GB statement said the athletes embodied its values of “pride, responsibility, respect and unity”.
Sbihi was talent-spotted by British Rowing’s talent identification programme when he was 15 at Hollyfield School in Surbiton. He was forced to go to trials by one of his teachers at the state school as he attempted to sneak off to the football pitches. The rower said he was “speechless” and “completely overwhelmed” when told he would become the fourth British rower to be afforded flag-bearing duties, after Jack Beresford in 1936, Sir Matthew Pinsent in 2000 and Sir Steve Redgrave, who did it twice, in 1992 and 1996.
“It is a huge honour just to be selected as the flag-bearer, and to know I’m the first person of Muslim faith it was a very proud moment,” he said. “We want more numbers, more representation so hopefully this will be part of the process of getting young kids involved in all different types of sport, especially rowing.”
Sbihi also follows in the footsteps of names such as Sir Andy Murray and Sir Chris Hoy, the respective flagbearers in Rio and London, as well as Anita Lonsbrough, who was the first woman to carry the flag for Team GB in 1964.
Ahead of the ceremony, he said he was hoping for guidance on flag-bearing etiquette from one of his predecessors. He said: “I’ll probably bump into Andy [Murray], I’m gonna ask him for some tips, because he’s around here in the village.”
Mills, 33, meanwhile, will become the most successful female sailor in Olympic history if she can win a second successive gold medal to add to the silver she won at London 2012. She joked she would “certainly not be starting a fight” with Sbihi over who gets to carry the flag first.
“I’m not sure how well that would go for me,” she said, laughing. “I’ve not thought about the logistics, to be honest. I’ve only just heard that myself [about sharing one flag].”
She added she was not sure whether she was up to the “one-armed holdout” famously demonstrated by Pinsent when he carried the flag on a lap of Sydney’s Olympic stadium in 2000. “I’m sure we’ll come up with a clever way that will ensure we both get a really special moment and get to be involved as much as possible. I don’t know. Maybe that’s why Moe is involved. He’s got the guns!”
With athletes terrified of catching Covid-19 or being identified as close contacts of a positive case, as well as the staggered entry into Tokyo and the Olympic Village, only around 30 of the 376-strong GB team are expected
to attend tonight’s ceremony.
‘It’s an honour to be selected as flag-bearer; to know I’m the first person of Muslim faith is a proud moment’