Olympic Games Tokyo 2020ish

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Ocelot Spleens Jul 2021 8:41am, 21 Jul 2021 31,404 posts	0 Ocelot Spleens There's womens football on right now!
swittle Jul 2021 8:42am, 21 Jul 2021 77,687 posts	0 swittle Certainly is!
Ocelot Spleens Jul 2021 8:47am, 21 Jul 2021 31,405 posts	0 Ocelot Spleens GOAL!
larkim Jul 2021 8:56am, 21 Jul 2021 15,139 posts	0 larkim Football at the Olympics is something that winds me up. For every other sport the Olympics is the pinnacle of the discipline. For football it's neutered by limits on ages in the men's category. So I really should say "men's football at the Olympics is something that winds me up". Good to see that the women's competition is both sensible in terms of the absence of such limitations and that the situation of the four "home nation" teams is resolved pragmatically with the England team being GB team through the World Cup qualification route. (Though I'm sure there will be some Scottish, Welsh and NI players who would wish that they could be selectable for the GB team nonetheless).
larkim Jul 2021 9:03am, 21 Jul 2021 15,140 posts	0 larkim Oops, some misinformation there. It looks like the England team qualified and effectively "leads" the team, but nonetheless they have also picked 3 (of 20) non-English players in the squad.
EvilPixie Jul 2021 10:14am, 21 Jul 2021 26,678 posts	0 EvilPixie The head of the World Health Organization, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, says the Tokyo Olympics should go ahead - to prove what can be done if the correct Covid safeguards are in place. Safeguards in place yet still loads of people getting it?!?!
Sushi. Jul 2021 10:20am, 21 Jul 2021 30,098 posts	0 Sushi. Surely a GB team should be represented by all GB countries and not England. Only right there’s players from other countries. Why should football be any different?
Ocelot Spleens Jul 2021 10:25am, 21 Jul 2021 31,407 posts	0 Ocelot Spleens England have by far the better players.
lammo Jul 2021 10:25am, 21 Jul 2021 10,634 posts	0 lammo Well i hope everybody involved is safe as can be, but i would like to see some action. Gymnastics on Saturday and Sunday morning which my daughter is super keen to see, and expects to be representing GB in 12 years time (well 11). I'll watch anything and everything though, bring it on.
larkim Jul 2021 10:35am, 21 Jul 2021 15,142 posts	0 larkim Sushi - I'm in 100% agreement, but for reasons of "history" (and arguably petty power struggles too) there are peculiarly British issues with the concept of a GB football team. (I raised it in the politics thread a few weeks ago and there are huge passions about the preservation of the four home nation teams). Most routes to qualification for Olympic spots revolve around international rankings or performances in other non-Olympic competitions, but as GB only ever fields a football team as GB at the Olympics there is a problem to be solved, and in the past both FIFA and the various home nation FAs have blocked things. So the compromise now is that whichever of the home nation teams does best in the relevant qualifying tournament (e.g. World Cup for women's football, or the U21s UEFA cup for men's football) gets become Team GB for the Olympics, though it appears that they can then recruit players from the other home nations (which seems entirely sensible). And I suppose it's only logical that if "England" did best in the women's World Cup then most of the English-led Team GB will be the same squad of England players. In terms of whether football is any different, apparently the same applies for field hockey and rugby sevens where presumably GB only ever plays in the Olympics. But as the sports are less high profile I suppose it goes under the radar. The bigger deal for me is the age limitation on the men's game, which is entirely down to FIFA wanting to ensure that the World Cup (in the men's game) is the only tournament which can be seen as the pinnacle of football. My view would be that if FIFA can't tolerate a "full strength" competition at the Olympics, then men's football shouldn't be there at all, but the flip side is that to not have football at the Olympics would leave one of the biggest and most universally played sports in the world not represented at the Olympics, and that seems equally daft.