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Faster, stronger, higher
Sep. 4th, 2008 10:07 amOne thing that the Olypmics Committee allows is for the host nation to introduce new sports to the competition on a "one in, one out" basis.
Most nations use this right to introduce sports which pretty much guarantee them medals, such as Basketball in the Los Angeles games or Taekwondo by the Koreans and this leaves the British with something of a conundrum, which was alluded to by BoJo at the handover ceremony: one side-effect of post imperialism is that we conquered the world and encouraged the entire globe to play our games. More than 80% of the sports in the Olympics were either invented or formally codified by the British and most of the good ones we invented are already there. What sport can we possibly introduce in 2012 to bring up our medal tally?
This is less of a problem for other nations with regional sports; nobody expects anyone to seriously challenge the USA in the World Series of Baseball because nobody plays Baseball outside of New York and Chicago. On the other hand, despite the Football Association rulebook being one of the most influential books ever written, nobody has expected much of British football on the world stage ever since a bunch of sailors said to some Brazilians "Hey, we've just invented a new game, anyone fancy a kickabout on the beach?" a hundred years ago.
If there's a downside to ruling the world, it's that when you have to up sticks and call it a day the rest of the world then proceeds to take a perverse glee in thrashing you silly at your national sports; look at the reactions of the West Indies, SA, NZ, Australia or India to winning at the cricket. When they play each other, it's a manly handshake. When they play England, it's cause for a national boozeup and mockery. It's been the same throughout history; the Germanic tribes took a great deal of pleasure in beating the Romans at their national sports of sacking, rape and pillage two thousand years ago.
So this leaves us with a conundrum. When even 19th century after-dinner games with tablemats and fruit (ping-pong) have become someone's national sport (China), it's difficult for the 2012 host nation to come up with anything to guarantee a podium topping moment or two. There's Rugby, but there are difficulties in running a multi-nation knockout tournament of the most violent sport of earth in under two weeks and expecting there to be any survivors let alone winners (other than New Zealand) so that's not a help.
Possibly the only option is to go really obscure.
[Poll #1253506]
Most nations use this right to introduce sports which pretty much guarantee them medals, such as Basketball in the Los Angeles games or Taekwondo by the Koreans and this leaves the British with something of a conundrum, which was alluded to by BoJo at the handover ceremony: one side-effect of post imperialism is that we conquered the world and encouraged the entire globe to play our games. More than 80% of the sports in the Olympics were either invented or formally codified by the British and most of the good ones we invented are already there. What sport can we possibly introduce in 2012 to bring up our medal tally?
This is less of a problem for other nations with regional sports; nobody expects anyone to seriously challenge the USA in the World Series of Baseball because nobody plays Baseball outside of New York and Chicago. On the other hand, despite the Football Association rulebook being one of the most influential books ever written, nobody has expected much of British football on the world stage ever since a bunch of sailors said to some Brazilians "Hey, we've just invented a new game, anyone fancy a kickabout on the beach?" a hundred years ago.
If there's a downside to ruling the world, it's that when you have to up sticks and call it a day the rest of the world then proceeds to take a perverse glee in thrashing you silly at your national sports; look at the reactions of the West Indies, SA, NZ, Australia or India to winning at the cricket. When they play each other, it's a manly handshake. When they play England, it's cause for a national boozeup and mockery. It's been the same throughout history; the Germanic tribes took a great deal of pleasure in beating the Romans at their national sports of sacking, rape and pillage two thousand years ago.
So this leaves us with a conundrum. When even 19th century after-dinner games with tablemats and fruit (ping-pong) have become someone's national sport (China), it's difficult for the 2012 host nation to come up with anything to guarantee a podium topping moment or two. There's Rugby, but there are difficulties in running a multi-nation knockout tournament of the most violent sport of earth in under two weeks and expecting there to be any survivors let alone winners (other than New Zealand) so that's not a help.
Possibly the only option is to go really obscure.
[Poll #1253506]
