LONDON — Britain’s international reputation will be in tatters if the Olympic Stadium is turned into a soccer-only venue after next year’s Games, London 2012 chief Sebastian Coe said Sunday.
Tottenham, which is competing with fellow English Premier League club West Ham to take over the venue, wants to tear down the 80,000-seat stadium after the Olympics and build another arena on the site without a running track and solely for soccer.
That would go against London’s pledge, made before the vote on the 2012 Olympics in 2005, that the 60,000-capacity stadium would be a purpose-built home for athletics.
“It’s really serious that we deliver on what we said we were going to deliver, unless we are prepared to trash our international reputation,” said Coe, chairman of the London Games’ organizing committee.
“If we don’t, it would be very difficult for us to be taken seriously again for the foreseeable future in the corridors of world sport. We made legacy commitments and those commitments are really important.”
West Ham would keep the track used for athletics and convert the stadium into a 60,000-seat venue for football, track and field, concerts and community use.
The Olympic Park Legacy Company, the body in charge of dealing with the stadium’s future, could also go ahead with its original plan to downsize the stadium to a 25,000-seat athletics venue.
A decision on the preferred bidder is expected to be given on Friday. It would then need ratification by two government departments and the mayor of London’s office.
Coe, a former British middle-distance Olympic champion, will have no say in the decision but put his weight behind West Ham’s bid.
“There is a bid that delivers against the vision that we took to Singapore (for the 2012 vote against Paris) and we have a moral obligation to make it (the vision) work,” Coe said.
“The West Ham bid meets those commitments. I would have to vote West Ham.”
Tottenham is proposing to retain an athletics legacy by redeveloping the Crystal Palace complex in South London, British track and field’s current home.
That still doesn’t satisfy Coe.
“I’m prepared to revisit my words that day (in Singapore), but I genuinely don’t recall a whole heap about bulldozing down a publicly funded facility, replacing it with a Premiership football club and inspiring a generation of Tottenham season-ticket holders, however many there may be on a waiting list,” Coe said.
Rome bidding for 2020 Games
CORTINA D’AMPEZZO, Italy — Rome is confident about its bid for the 2020 Summer Games following Italian Olympic Committee president Giovanni Petrucci’s recent meeting with IOC president Jacques Rogge.
Petrucci spoke with Rogge during International Olympic Committee meetings in Switzerland last week and said Rogge was enthusiastic about Rome’s intentions.
“We’re moving forward with our candidacy and we’re very confident,” Petrucci told The Associated Press Sunday.
Rome, which hosted the 1960 Games, is the only city so far to have been nominated by its national Olympic committee to bid for 2020.
The South African city of Durban also is expected to enter the race in a bid to bring the games to Africa for the first time, while other potential bidders include Tokyo; Madrid; Istanbul, Turkey; Doha, Qatar; and Dubai, United Arab Emirates.
Rome lost to Athens in a close vote to host the 2004 Games.
“We really believe this time, while at the same time realizing it’s difficult,” Petrucci said.
The Italian said he was sure that Tokyo will bid, although the Japanese city’s efforts could be weakened if Pyeongchang, South Korea, is awarded the 2018 Winter Games in an IOC vote in July.
The IOC would be reluctant to award consecutive games to Asia.
“Each candidate has advantages and disadvantages,” Petrucci said.
The CONI president also confirmed that 100- and 200-metre world record holder Usain Bolt will run at the Golden Gala in Rome on May 26.
“That was a really big score that the athletics federation made,” Petrucci said, adding that he doesn’t know yet whether Bolt will run the 100 or 200. “That’s up to him, we’re just happy he’s coming.”
CONI and the Italian athletics federation are scheduled to present Bolt’s participation in a news conference Friday.