The International Society of Olympic Historians (ISOH) has laid a wreath at the memorial in Munich to mark the 50th anniversary of the terror attack on the Israeli team at the 1972 Olympics.

David Wallechinsky, the doyen of Olympic observers, has said he will not attend the Beijing 2022 Winter Games that start on Friday (February 4) because of what he describes as "the intrusive 'surveillance bubble' imposed on visitors by the Chinese Government."

I felt a mixture of satisfaction and despair earlier this week when it was revealed that Russia's Tatyana Chernova had tested positive for banned drugs following a re-analysis of her sample from the 2008 Olympics in Beijing and the bronze medal she had won in the heptathlon would be stripped away from her and awarded instead to Britain's Kelly Sotherton.

David Wallechinsky has confirmed that, for the first time since 1984, he will not be publishing a new version of The Complete Book of the Olympics on the eve of the Summer Games - and added that writing what has become established as one of sport’s set texts is “no longer cost-effective.”

As the Rio Olympics loom large on the horizon, there is good news and bad as far as David Wallechinsky, that doyen of Olympic observers, is concerned: he will be in Brazil to cover his 17th Games BUT there will be no fresh and updated edition of his sporting set text, The Complete Book of the Olympics, which has proved an unrivalled companion to the Games for so many thousands of sports followers since it first appeared in 1984.