Diack Blasts Olympic Stadium Plans
International Athletics Association Federation chief Lamine Diack has warned Britain that there would be ‘no way to come back’ from converting the 2012 Olympic Stadium into a football ground.
Tottenham Hotspur and West Ham are vying or occupancy of the stadium but Diack insists that London will have told a ‘big lie’ to get the Olympics.
The original plans for the Olympic Stadium were to retain the running track and leave athletics a lasting legacy from the Games.
If Tottenham wins its joint bid with AEG to occupy the ground it will rip out the running track from the stadium.
But Diack says that Britain’s reputation in sport will be terminally damaged if that happened: ‘They’ll have made a big lie during their presentation. There will be no credibility… of a great country like Britain.’
Diack also said that Britain wouldn’t be considered to host future sporting events: ‘(There would be) no way to comeback as far as my generation is concerned, you can consider you are dead. You are finished.’
‘This nation has a number of heroes in athletics. I could spend an hour, listing one by one all those who’ve achieved fantastic things in athletics. They are still there, involved. And this country, this city saying that I’m not able to have a stadium of athletics?’ added Diack.
Tottenham Hotspur’s aspirations of moving into the Olympic Stadium after the London 2012 Games could take a major blow after Crystal Palace Football Club has confirmed it is keen to renovate the Crystal Palace National Sports Centre.
The Championship club is looking at moving from Selhurst Park to an ‘exciting new venture’, which is thought to be the National Sports Centre.
The plans could put a stop to Tottenham’s Olympic Stadium bid as the club was planning to revamp the National Sports Centre in a bid to keep an athletics legacy in the city.
The Olympic Park Legacy Committee (OPLC) is set to recommend which bid it thinks should take over the stadium by 28th January, but any decision will also have to be agreed by London mayor Boris Johnson and the government.
