You may have missed the Olympics. If so, you must have been out of the country, or denied access to any kind of media. If so, I should explain that it is a recurring worldwide event that focuses on athletics and swimming but includes ever more bizarre activities that attract the description “sports”.
I wasn’t thinking of taekwondo in particular, but I would like to exclude sports where the observer can’t see what the participant is trying to achieve, or where you can’t see whether they succeeded or not.
Mr Grumpy – that’s me. To be honest, I watched a lot of sports, many of them several times, thanks to the BBC’s bizarre scheduling. But despite the brilliant achievement of Keely Hodgkinson in the 800m, I found myself more often than not rather irritated – and not just because the USA won so many medals because it has such a huge population. I think the states should take part individually, but I can see how this view may not be shared by many people.
I also think it’s time we abolished all sports where medals depend on the opinion of judges, like boxing, diving or anything with artistic impression. Judges are too easily open to bias and straightforward error. I want to see someone clearly win or clearly lose. Of course trap shooting, where the judges don’t seem to be able to see whether a moving target is hit or not, might also have to be excluded.
How about those sports where foul play is indistinguishable from good play, like basketball and hockey? The rules are so nitpicking that I am constantly amazed at how calmly the players react to ridiculous decisions. Or maybe it’s not the decisions that are ridiculous, but the rules? Someone should sort that out.
Weren’t the opposing and closing ceremonies wonderful? Not so much. I missed the opening one, but I read that it was capable of unpleasant religious interpretations. In fact the whole ceremony thing is open to the criticism that it is a glorification of mankind, when we have a lot to be modest about. I guess it is part of the plan to exclude God from everything, or maybe I’m misinterpreting it? It was refreshing to see some athletes (particularly Americans, come to think of it) thanking God for their success.
I did see the closing ceremony, which had some good points – although it achieved the near-impossible feat of making the French National Anthem sound boring. I do have to admit that the whole thing was very clever, in a way that reminded me of prog-rock: tremendously skilful but in the end not very interesting. Tom Cruise was quite interesting, though.
One final thought about the commentary. Is it just me that likes to see unexpected winners? To listen to the commentators on the BBC, you would think that people winning again and again was what all the spectators wanted. Adulation of the top stars often just took over, especially if they were friends of the commentators. And I have to say I felt extremely sorry for those unfortunates who had to interview the athletes after their events. How did that feel? What were your thoughts? Are you pleased to have won? Sorry to have lost? Tell us that again, but in a different way… Don’t hit me.
What we really want is someone British taking a medal in a totally unexpected fashion and then seeing it again, with comments. Possibly a third time. What we don’t want is a favourite just going out there and doing what they were expected to do. Except Keely. Keely is wonderful. We love Keely.