Japan’s leader says world should see safe Olympics

The world needs to see that Japan can stage a safe Olympics, the country’s prime minister told sports officials Tuesday ahead of the Tokyo Games.

Tens of thousands of athletes, officials, games staff and media are arriving in Japan amid a local state of emergency and widespread opposition from the general public.

Events start Wednesday — in softball and women’s soccer — two days ahead of the formal opening ceremony of an Olympics already postponed a year because of the coronavirus pandemic.

“The world is faced with great difficulties,” Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga told International Olympic Committee members in a closed-door meeting at a five-star hotel in Tokyo, adding “we can bring success to the delivery of the Games.”

“Such fact has to be communicated from Japan to the rest of the world,” Suga said through an interpreter. “We will protect the health and security of the Japanese public.”

He acknowledged Japan’s path through the pandemic toward the Olympics had gone “sometimes backward at times.”

“But vaccination has started and after a long tunnel an exit is now in our sight,” Suga said.

The prime minister’s office said Monday more than 21% of Japan’s 126 million population has been inoculated.

Health experts in Japan have questioned allowing so many international visitors for the games, which end on Aug. 8. There will be no local or foreign fans at events. The Paralympics will follow in late August.

Praising vaccine manufacturers for working on a dedicated Olympic rollout, IOC President Thomas Bach singled out Pfizer BioNTech for “a truly essential contribution.”

This cooperation meant “85% of Olympic Village residents and 100% of IOC members present here have been either vaccinated or are immune” to COVID-19,

Bach said.

Bach has been met with anti-Olympic chants from protesters on visits in Japan since arriving two weeks ago, including at a state welcome party with Suga on Sunday.

“They will admire the Japanese people for what they achieved,” Bach said, insisting the games will send a message of peace, solidarity and resilience.

SOFTBALL UNDERWAY

The Olympics got underway after a one-year delay when Japan pitcher Ukiko Ueno started Australia’s Michelle Cox with a ball at 9:02 a.m. Wednesday 8:02 p.m EDT Tuesday (Wednesday morning in Japan) to open the women’s softball tournament before a nearly empty Fukushima Azuma Baseball Stadium.

Playing about 150 miles from the main Olympics sites in Tokyo, the teams lined up for the national anthems in a stadium with a listed capacity of

30,000 that had about 50 spectators, presumably team and Olympic officials, plus media.

Australia took a 1-0 lead in the first when the 39year-old Ueno forced in a run by hitting Chelsea

Forkin with a pitch, her second straight hit batter.

U.S. TOPS MEDAL FORECAST

In a forecast done by Gracenote, which supplies statistical analysis to sports leagues around the world, the United States is picked to win the most overall medals as well as the most gold medals. After that, the picking gets more difficult.

China is probably the next choice but many athletes from the country have appeared in few international events since the pandemic. This makes predictions difficult since Gracenote’s calculations are based on the most recent performances in top level events like world championships and so forth.

A team from Russia, host nation Japan and Britain are expected to be among the top five.

COMPANIES STAY AWAY

More Japanese companies have decided against sending executives to Friday’s opening ceremony as concerns about holding the games during the pandemic grow.

Senior officials from Nippon Telegraph & Telephone Corp., Fujitsu Ltd. and NEC Corp. will skip the event given that organizers decided to hold the games without spectators, spokespeople for the technology giants said Tuesday, a day after Toyota Motor Corp. announced its top executive wouldn’t attend.

U.S. BASEBALL

Nick Martinez combined with three relievers on a five-hitter and Miami native Eddy Alvarez walked with the bases loaded in the sixth inning, giving the U.S. Olympic team a 1-0 win over a college national team in an exhibition on Monday night.

Alvarez, a Marlins minor-leaguer who is aiming to become only the third American to earn medals at both the Winter and Summer Olympics, hit a home run in another exhibition win on Sunday.

BRIEFS TOO BRIEF?

Olivia Breen, a double Paralympic world champion for the United Kingdom, said she was stunned after a sporting official said her sprint briefs were “too short and inappropriate” at a recent competition.

Breen said she planned to wear the same shorts while she competes at Tokyo’s Paralympic

Games next month and made an official complaint over the remarks. The 24-year-old, who won a bronze medal at the London 2012 Paralympics, said she has been wearing the same style of shorts for almost a decade and that up until now, it had never been an issue.

ELSEWHERE

Weightlifting: A Ugandan athlete who fled during pre-Olympics training in western Japan last week has been found and is being interviewed by police. Julius Ssekitoleko, a 20-year-old weightlifter, fled his hotel in Izumisano on Friday, leaving behind a note saying he didn't want to return to his country, that he wanted to stay in Japan and work. He did not meet Olympic standards in the latest rankings released after he arrived Japan and was to return home this week.