This could be the most intriguing year of my competitive life. After a long, hard, cold winter of training, we can see our first major international competition on the horizon - the Champions Trophy in Amsterdam in late June.

We have serious intent to go even better than we did last year when the England women's hockey team won two bronze medals at world level events and a bronze at the Commonwealth Games in Delhi.

Now we're looking forward to the challenge of turning those medals into silver or even gold at the Champions Trophy and then at the European Championships in Germany in August. Both countries take their hockey very seriously. The atmosphere will be amazing. All the better for us.

Both competitions carry world ranking points, so both are very important. But more than that, it's about raising our game, building our confidence and momentum with just a year to go to London 2012. Not to mention the fact that the GB men are reigning European Champions and it would be a great thing for us to match their achievement.

You can feel the tension. And that is not a bad thing. In every tournament we will be putting pressure on ourselves to perform, to try and replicate - if you can - what we will experience in London. Every time we step on the pitch we need to make sure we come up with the goods.

It is my 26th birthday at the Europeans in Germany. Obviously, I would like it to be celebrations all round and what better way to do it, than with a gold medal!

GB Hockey's centralised programme has made a massive difference to all those lucky enough to be involved. Instead of training separately all over the country we have come together at Bisham Abbey, to train together, play together and develop together as a squad.

Being a collective unit day-in-day-out can only make us understand each other better both on and off the pitch. We'll need to draw on that as we play the toughest teams in the world. We're thankful for the UK Sport and lottery funding that's made it possible. Fingers crossed it continues beyond 2012.

I've been around a while in the sport. I made my senior debut in 2003, but I have never played Germany in Germany before. They were gold medalists at the Athens Olympics in 2004, so that makes them formidable opposition - we already know our pool group: Ireland, Belgium and Germany.

But we've been in this situation before. Last year at the World Cup we played Argentina in Argentina - the noise made the stadium shake - and we took them very close. It wasn't so much 11 v 11, as 11 vs an entire country. The balance definitely swings to the home team's favour when you have screaming fans like that. Home crowds always help give teams an extra edge, which is why we are looking forward to London 2012 so much.

In the low, hard, exhausting points you inevitably have during the long training stints, the one thought that makes you better, stronger and mentally prepared is the end-game. The Olympics. You dream. You wouldn't be human if you didn't dream about the London Olympics and the 630,000 spectators that will watch the whole tournament on its now-famous blue pitch.

If we play well and rise to the momentous occasion, it could change the way our sport is perceived for all time.

Crista Cullen, Britain's full-back, made her international debut in 2003 and has since been capped 43 times by GB

Great Britain Hockey is represented by www.davidwelchmanagement.com

Reform is the cry of the hour for FIFA. But, the question is: where does the reform start? It is not enough to open up FIFA in Zurich.

For real reform, we need to go to the heart of the organisation which extends beyond Zurich around the world. Without a worldwide fundamental structural reform, no amount of changes in Zurich will enable FIFA to come out of the crisis that has engulfed it.

People who run FIFA in Zurich may make all the right noises and promise to drive the devils and the money changers from the temple. But, even if they are truly determined to clean up FIFA and impose ironclad laws, the problem is that they are not in total control of world football.

The problem is that the central organisation in Zurich obscures the fact that FIFA is a series of Confederations. Some, like UEFA, are far richer and more powerful than others but each of the confederations has its own way of working. In that sense, FIFA House, for all its shiny, swanky offices in Zurich, is more like the Mughal Empire of India in the 18th century or China under the warlords in the 19th century.

The empires of these ancient lands had one thing in common. While the emperor in Delhi or Beijing was meant to be the supreme ruler, and treated with much visible display of his power suggesting he could get many things done, the reality was that he could only do as much as his regional barons allowed. So, for all the glory of the central ruler, his power to influence events in the far flung corners of his empire was often extremely limited, particularly if regional war lords were themselves powerful. The decay of both empires began with revolts from regional barons until such time that the central authority was proved to be as powerless as many had long suspected.

FIFA is the modern day equivalent. To add to FIFA's problems, compared to most other sports bodies, FIFA is democrat with one member, one vote. And this means that anyone seeking election to the FIFA Presidency has to court all the voters. This is hardly the case in most other sports organisations or even some much celebrated political systems. It provides a wonderful opportunity to those who can play the football political game.

But this is not the only layer of politics. The other equally important layer is that of the confederations from different continents of which FIFA is made up. Because of the existence of these Confederations, this layer of politics comes into play at elections for FIFA's Executive Committee. So you have a President elected by the entire FIFA Congress with Executive Committee members elected by their Confederations. So FIFA's Executive has in-built power blocks who owe their allegiance, not to the President or the Congress but to their own Confederation. It is this that has made FIFA the most curious of organisation with two concentric circles of sports politicians constantly trying to please their constituents.


Joao Havelange (pictured above left with Blatter in centre) was the first to exploit this unique sports political system. He became President back in 1974, beating England's Sir Stanley Rous by courting votes from non-Europeans. In the process, like any politician, he made pledges to his supporters. He could see that football was dominated by Europe and his answer was a relentless expansion of world football, providing an exponential growth in FIFA competitions. This has meant that, under Havelange and Sepp Blatter, his anointed successor, the two FIFA tournaments of 1974 – the World Cup and the Olympic football tournament - have now grown to 11. These include beach football and all sorts of tournaments for women. This is the sort of exercise in power politicians or, for that matter, emperors could only have dreamt of.

As he went round the world inaugurating new tournaments, Havelange knew that the World Cup he had inherited was the only product that would make money for FIFA. The other tournaments would never wash their face. They still do not.

Indeed, FIFA makes so little money from these competitions that it does not even give detailed breakdowns of the figures, while emphasising the money it makes from the World Cup. The figures for the last three years explain FIFA's reluctance.

In 2008, the FIFA World Cup made $550 million (£333 million) from broadcasting rights, other FIFA events a mere $6 million (£3.6 million). In 2009 the FIFA World Cup's broadcast revenue was $623 million (£378 million), while only $27 million (£16 million)came from other events. And, in 2010, the year of the World Cup in South Africa, FIFA made $2.408 million (£1.459 million) from broadcasters while other events contributed $40 million (£24 million). In 2010 FIFA did give a breakdown of what it made from marketing rights from other events and the picture was even more revealing. The South African World Cup generated $1.072 billion (£649 million), the marketing income from the other 10 events was just $25 million (£15 million).

FIFA Presidents have always dressed this up in high moral tones - taking the game to the neglected parts of the world and reaching places nobody, not even politicians, can. The real purpose of these other events is to take global competitions to the various Confederations, all of whom have many members, each with a vote. As an exercise in pork barrel politics, this is something even the most seasoned American politicians could not better.

The problem for Blatter, or anybody who takes charge of FIFA, is that the corruption crisis means that they can no longer carry on as if nothing has happened. However, if they are determined to clean up the organisation, there is much that could be done. For a start, FIFA's accounts could be more transparent and fully disclose the dreadful losses all the tournaments, apart from the World Cup, make and how they are subsidised by FIFA's only saleable commodity.

FIFA also needs to be more transparent about the money distributed through Goal Project, meant to fund facilities round the world, and how it is accounted for in the country that receives it.

But, more than that, FIFA needs to make the Confederations more transparent and accountable. Some, like UEFA already, are. Others would need to be taught what the word accountable means. And this is where the FIFA bosses in Zurich will face their greatest problem. World pressure may force them to open FIFA's books. But how do you reform the workings of the various Confederations, some of whom are run as if they learnt their business sense if not their ethics from Chinese war lords and India's Mughal rulers.

We shall have to see how serious FIFA is for reform. But, however serious, the fundamental problem may be the lack of power to enforce change on a worldwide scale.

Mihir Bose is one of the world's most astute observers on politics in sport and, particularly, football. He formerly wrote for The Sunday Times and The Daily Telegraph and until recently was the BBC's head sports editor.

www.mihirbose.com

http://twitter.com/mihirbose

You're generally all right if you do track and field. Of course, if you are a shot putter or a discus thrower, or maybe a long jumper or a triple jumper, you might find yourself getting only four attempts in competition rather than the normal six. Normal as in what you are used to, that is.

But by and large, if you run the 100 metres or the 3,000m steeplechase you are unlikely to find that it's all change for the next Olympics but one. "Sorry, we're freshening up the sprints. From now on it's the 75 metres. And remember - the last 25 metres need to be run backwards. Oh, and the steeplechase. Yes. Well all it is, is that the water jump's been beefed up - but don't worry, you've got a choice of either front crawl or butterfly. Whichever suits."

Same goes for football. Although having said that, I recall FIFA toying more than half seriously with the idea of improving the spectacle by increasing the size of the goals. More goals, more satisfaction was the line of thinking. What I say is, if that's what the game's about - and FIFA should know – why stop at enlarging the goals? Get some extra balls in there, four or five at least. They'll be banging shots home every five to ten seconds. Everybody wins.

Or how about this? To stimulate spectator interest in the big World Cup games, why not randomly fail to give a goal where the ball has obviously crossed the line?

Actually scrap that idea. It wouldn't work.

Broadly speaking, however, football is not hugely messed around with. Football is The Dude, and The Dude Abides.

For those engaged in lower profile sports, however, the same cannot be said.

Paul Goodison is an Olympic champion in sailing's Laser class. Were it not for the fact that the 2012 Olympics are on his home territory - or at Weymouth, which is very close to it – he would probably have moved on to another challenge.


The lure of defending his title on British water proved too great to resist. But Goodison had already mapped out his next move – a shift to the Star class, which has been a part of every Olympic regatta since 1932.

The latest pronouncement of the international sailing body (ISAF), which is dropping the Star class from the Games as of 2016 to make way for a new discipline, means that Goodison's aspirations are now as naught. Maybe he could consider a sex change to enter the new women's skiff class.

Nor did the move thrill Britain's triple Olympic champion Ben Ainslie, who was also considering a move to the Star class from the Finn event. Ainslie disparaged the "turmoil" within the sport, adding that it would be better to get a focus and move forwards.

Also removed after 2012 will be the Elliott 6m class, for which the Yngling class had to make way following Beijing. That decision left Britain's victorious Yngling trio of Sarah Ayton, Sarah Webb and Pippa Wilson high and dry in the wake of Beijing. And for what, you now wonder?

But it's not only sailors who have to cope with such radical and unlooked changes to their competitive environment.

Another time-honoured event, the modern pentathlon - which has its roots in the five-discipline event involving running, discus throwing, jumping, spear throwing and wrestling which was introduced at the Ancient Games in 708 BC - has become the modernised pentathlon since the 2008 Beijing Games.

Radical change had already taken place some years earlier when the timetable was compressed into a single day, but the decision of the international governing body (UIPM) in 2009 to combine the two final disciplines of the event, the shoot and the run, altered the aspect of this noble sport almost to the point of distortion. (Why did they stop there? They could have pushed the envelope and combined another two disciplines by having fencing battles on horseback. Or maybe by having the horses swim against each other with riders aboard.)

In the space of the last six months, the international governing body of what might now reasonably be re-named the modern quadrathlon decided to throw another change into the mix as they advanced their plans to use lasers rather than air pistols for the shooting.

This additional layer of change has altered the balance of the competition yet again. Laser shots, which have no recoil, can therefore be made more swiftly, which means pentathletes spend even less time in front of the targets, pushing more emphasis back onto the sheer physical prowess of running.

So has the technical element within pentathlon been diminished?

Perhaps. Or, if Jan Bartu, the British team's performance director, is right in his suggestion, perhaps not. Bartu believes the latest change will mean radical shifts in position will be less likely to occur in the final phase, so competitors will have to ensure they are well in the hunt before the run-shoot gets underway. Which means in turn a refocusing on the technical events of fencing and equestrianism.

Whether Bartu is right remains to be seen. But the reaction of two of his charges at the University of Bath base made it clear that all this tinkering is having an unsettling effect on competitors. Sam Weale made the point that it was unreasonable to ask pentathletes to cope with two major changes in the space of a single Olympiad. His team-mate Freya Prentice expressed concerns over the very different feel of shooting with lasers, and particularly the difficulty it created in tracking shot placement.

It may be that this latest change - which will have the effect of making it safer for youngsters to take up the sport - will be something which secures modern pentathlon's long-term future within the Games, which would offer some justification. But there comes a point when you have to ask yourself what exactly it is that you are attempting to perpetuate.

Not that change is intrinsically bad in Olympic terms. The list of the Games's discontinued events contains relatively few entries which would make you shake your head at the folly of their removal. Or am I wrong? Is there a place in the modern Olympics for two-handed javelin throwing, or motorboating, pelota basque and the tug-of-war?


Of course, some change is intrinsically good for the Games. Ask Ed McKeever (pictured).

When the canoeing event over 500m (the K1 500), at which Tim Brabants took bronze in Beijing, was discontinued as from 2012 in favour of the sexy new distance of 200m, Brabants's British colleague was one of many who had no idea how they would fare in it.

But McKeever, who has always been naturally fast but has struggled with the endurance side of the sport, now finds this new event fitting him as snugly as a wetsuit. It might almost have been invented for him, in fact, as he has already established himself as European and world champion (check) and two World Cup wins so far this season have done nothing to detract from his position as a medal favourite with London 2012 approaching (which has its own drawbacks, although we will not discuss those right now.)

McKeever's enthusiasm has been shared by his fellow competitors. As he notes, when he used to race at the 500 and 1000m distances in European and world events, there would typically be four or five heats. The new sprint distance is attracting so many extra competitors that six or seven heats are now required to start reducing the numbers.

So canoeing's governing body appears to have got things right when it comes to change. As for sailing and modern pentathlon - the jury is still out.

Mike Rowbottom, one of Britain's most talented sportswriters, has covered the last five Summer and four Winter Olympics for The Independent. Previously he has worked for the Daily Mail, The Times, The Observer, the Sunday Correspondent and The Guardian. He is now chief feature writer for insidethegames

Seb Coe calls her "relentless". By that he means she is one of the most driven and determined women he has encountered in sport. And he terms her project "sensational".

Outside of athletics aficionados few may know of Connie Henry. She won a Commonwealth bronze medal in the triple jump for England in Kuala Lumpur in 1998.

Subsequently she immersed herself making a career in broadcasting, working behind the mic for the IAAF and boxing promoter Frank Warren, as an engaging and perceptive interviewer of sports personalities.

She gave this up three years ago to return to her alma mater in Willesden, North London, to set up and run her own athletics academy for local youngsters in one of the city's most deprived areas.

This week all the hard work and dedication came to fruition when the Academy was recognised by the internationally prestigious Laureus Sport for Good Foundation as a worthy cause for their support.

Hence the presence of LOCOG chief Lord Coe and, among other luminaries, Michael Johnson and Sir Steve Redgrave to formally cement the partnership at the packed Willesden Sports Centre this week.

As Coe said: "This is exactly the kind of thing that will help us achieve an Olympic legacy of getting more young people involved in sport. It is a way sport helps them fashion their future."

Moreover, it is doing so without Government assistance.

Olympic bronze medal hurdler Natasha Danvers,one of the Academy's trustees, says of Henry: "It is very easy in athletics to walk away and give nothing back. Connie hasn't done that. She has offered kids the kind of support that changes lives."


What makes 39-year-old Connie Henry (pictured), and her Academy, so special is that the kids, the majority from ethnic minorities in the area, are offered, in addition to athletics coaching, education in the way of extra studying, tutoring support and personal mentoring, skills she acquired in her time both as a coach and teacher.

To join the Academy they must be employed, in education or vocational training, though Henry and her team will help them in this respect.

Children growing up in Brent, particularly on infamous estates like Stonebridge, are under constant pressure to join gangs, run drugs and get involved in crime. As Henry points out, sport or physical, activity at any level has the unique ability to inspire and ultimately to show youngsters that they can achieve whatever they set their mind to.

It is, she admits, unlikely that many of the 500 enrolled at the Track Academy will become Olympians but through sport they will be inspired to understand what it takes to lead a successful and fulfilling life.

"If the Track Academy creates Olympic athletes along the way, then it is a valuable by-product of what the project is trying to achieve," she says.

"The fact is that kids are not coming into athletics these days so we must take the sport to them."

With financial support from Laureus, whose Foundation embraces 84 projects around the world promoting the use of sport for social change, Connie's Class of 2011, which has the services of ten coaches led by Clarence Callender, looks set to blossom.

A heartening example of how, as Natasha Danvers says, ex-athletes can put their experience and knowledge to practical use once the running, jumping and throwing are done.

Which bring us to another inspirational figure. It has been my week for encountering sporty ladies who are both doughty and delightful.

It is good to report that across in east London, deep in Olympic heartland, another sports Academy, founded by former Olympic javelin gold medallist Tessa Sanderson is back in the business of helping to creating new champions.

A couple of months ago Sanderson fell out big time with her backers, Newham Council, following a funding row and quit her role Olympic as director of the highly successful Newham Sports Academy.

But our Tessa is as equally "relentless" as Connie Henry and she has re-grouped and re-established the Academy and her own Tessa Sanderson Foundation at Newham Sports College, where she believes she may have discovered the new Daley Thompson.


To do so she has courageously picked up the baton discarded by Newham Council, who while apparently cash-strapped, are still managing to subsidise the refiguring of the Olympic Stadium for West Ham's anticipated tenancy with £40 million borrowed from The Treasury.

The 1984 Olympic champion was understandably aggrieved at this, and also by her exclusion from voting on the future of the stadium despite being a member of the Olympic Park Legacy Company Board.

There was some acrimony surrounding her subsequent departure from the Academy where she had nurtured around 70 potential Olympians.

But she tells me: "That's all behind us now. We're moving on again thanks to the support of Newham College of Further Education."

The youngster who she believes can become one of Britain's best all-round athletes is 18-year-old Montserrat-born Jahmal Germain, She first talent-spotted him training at a local leisure centre 18 months ago.

"He was originally a sprinter but he is developing into fantastic decathlete."

Germain, coached by Greg Richards, who assisted Thompson in his spectacular career,scored 6,315 points in a recent competition against the best UK's senior and junior decathletes which puts in the top five of his age group.

"He is getting better all the time," says Sanderson. I am really excited about him, but of course what he needs now is sponsorship.

"For me Daley has always been the greatest but this lad is such a natural it's unbelievable."

The grittiness and gumption of sportswomen like Connie Henry and Tessa Sanderson in putting so much of their time and expertise back into the grass roots of thee game into the game is a refreshing reminder that modern sport is not completely dominated by avaricious.salacious bed-hopping super-injuncting superstars.

As the song says, thank heaven for little girls. Or in this case big ones. More power to their respective elbows.

Alan Hubbard is an award-winning sports columnist for The Independent on Sunday, and a former sports editor of The Observer. He has covered a total of 16 Summer and Winter Olympics, 10 Commonwealth Games, several football World Cups and world title fights from Atlanta to Zaire.

Can next week's FIFA Presidential election possibly go ahead on schedule as a result of the latest seismic bombshell to hit football's world governing body?

The decision by FIFA to investigate claims that Sepp Blatter's only challenger, Mohamed Bin Hammam, and the organisation's longest-serving vice-president, Jack Warner, were both caught up in a bribery sensation is by far and away the most damning of all the recent scandals to strike at the heart of the governing body's hierarchy.

Far more damning than the cash-for-votes suspensions of two other FIFA Executive Committee members just before last December's World Cup ballot.

And far more damning than recent unproven accusations involving six more FIFA Executive Committee members, including Warner, over the bidding process for both the 2018 and 2022 World Cups.

This time, we are told, there are sworn affidavits. And most importantly of all, this time the case is being heard not as a result of a newspaper expose or under British Parliamentary privilege but after being brought to the attention of FIFA by one of their own inner sanctum, none other than the US Executive Committee member Chuck Blazer.

What, one might ask, were Blazer's motives? After all, he and Warner have worked together at the head of the CONCACAF confederation for as long as most of us can remember. Could it be that there was more love lost between the pair over the years than either would have us believe?

Or was it simply that, even at the risk of sacrificing his relationship with Warner, Blazer felt he had to act in the interests of fair play?

The burly American, a highly qualified lawyer, is as canny as they come. You can bet your last dollar - so to speak - that he would not be putting his reputation on the line unless he felt the information at his disposal was so serious it needed to be brought into the open.

Whose to say whether it might have leaked out at some stage in the future and heaped even more dirt on FIFA just when the organisation is trying desperately to clean up its act?

Ironically, ever since he launched his election manifesto, Bin Hammam has talked about the need for greater transparency following the recent ugly spate of corruption allegations. Behind in the polls, he had hoped to pick up crucial support in the days leading up to the election on June 1.

Now, however, he himself has become embroiled in the most outrageous development of the whole sorry saga, his credibility – and that of Warner – having taken a massive hit.

If and how Bin Hammam can wriggle out of it remains to be seen. The likelihood of him taking on Blatter next week must already be in serious doubt. Firstly, FIFA's Ethics Committee meets on Sunday – three days before the election. Secondly, if found guilty bin Hammam would surely appeal. And that will take weeks rather than days to resolve.

If Bin Hammam does end up being provisionally suspended just before the election, his supporters would doubtless cry foul at their man being unceremoniously ditched before having a proper chance to defend himself.

He could, of course, simply throw in the towel and allow Blatter a free run, ironically just what the 75-year-old Swiss had expected in the first place before Bin Hammam announced his challenge.

But even then, holding an election amid the stench of corruption would not go down well with member federations – or the public at large. Blatter would be accused, rightly or wrongly, of manipulating events in order to secure a fourth and final term as the lone candidate by default.

In the background, of course, is the question of how Bin Hammam's suddenly tarnished image will affect his native Qatar. Only this week, their World Cup 2022 officials launched a passionate and strongly-worded defence of their conduct throughout the bid process in the wake of unsubstantiated accusations.

To see their most powerful administrator in the spotlight for all the wrong reasons must leave them wondering what on earth they have to do to prove to the world that they are beyond reproach.

Andrew Warshaw is a former sports editor of The European, the newspaper that broke the Bosman story in the 1990s, the most significant issue to shape professional football as we know it today. Before that, he worked for the Associated Press for 13 years in Geneva and London. He is now the chief football reporter for our sister publication, insideworldfootball.

Regular readers of this blog will know that I have long questioned the lack of any strategy for delivering the promised 2012 legacy of more people participating in sport. Now, a new report is warning, "the legacy promise will come in time to be viewed as a highly effective sales pitch that was never fully realised."

The Centre for Social Justice have today published a report damning the promised Olympic legacy as little more than a sales pitch and suggesting that it was never possible to deliver that promise.

However, while I agree with the sentiment of the report I find myself disagreeing with the claim that the promised legacy was impossible to deliver. It is probably more palatable to believe that than it is the alternatives that either we never tried or that those tasked with the job were simply not up to it.

Whether we call it an Olympic legacy or whether we call it the benefits of sound sports development planning is irrelevant. It is true that the opportunity to put such planning in place with the benefit of the Olympics placing sport into the front of minds up and down the country has likely been missed. However, that does not mean that it is too late to begin adopting the principles that have been absent and start better developing sport both for its own sake and for the purpose of social benefit.

The sad truth is that for modern day sports managers whether they are at the DCMS, Sport England or with governing bodies, a good sound bite will always trump a good strategy. It has reached such proportions that it appears possible they actually do not know the difference.

Last year, after promising his Government had a strategy for the development of sport, Sport and Olympics Minister Hugh Robertson was asked to "show us your strategy Minister." We still wait and Robertson has not returned to that debate.

He was present for the launch of Places People Play frequently presented as a strategy for developing grass-roots sport but in reality little more than a collection of initiatives given spin and a brand name.

It is a game the previous Government also played, not just with sport but with any number of issues. In place of sound planning, create an initiative; what Robertson damned as "initiativeitis" before then continuing its use in sport.

For many of the managers filling roles in sport, it has never been any different. To them, this is how you "develop" sport. Many are "generalists" employing generalist skills to the specific specialism of creating strategy. The result is that while many of those strategies sound good at the press conference they fail to deliver. They announce to the world what they seek to achieve without considering how. Then quietly they fall from use and within another couple of years there is another press conference, another announcement and another "strategy" doomed to the same demise.

It is no use looking for blame; the sorry truth is that there is little likelihood of anyone being to blame. They are operating in a blind spot, where they assume a level of knowledge based on a 'this is how we do things' approach which everyone else is also employing.

Good managers should be able to say, "this is not my specialism". They should know the difference between management and leadership. Good managers ask for help from the experts in order to do things better next time, in order to seek continual improvement.

The management of sport, from Minister down, unfortunately views the maintaining of a mediocre status quo as the pathway to success and, until they change, it is not just the promised Olympic legacy which will go undelivered – it is the development of sport to its full potential within society.

Jim Cowan is a former athlete, coach, event organiser and sports development specialist who is the founder of Cowan Global, a company specialising in consultancy, events and education and training. For more details click here

Excuse me for not joining in the ballyhoo over the Olympic Torch Relay last week.

In case you missed it, with a year to go until the Olympic flame arrives in the UK, the London 2012 Organising Committee announced the first 74 locations on its estimated 8,000 mile journey around the country.

The truth is, I'm a purist where the Torch Relay is concerned.

In essence, I think it is one of the most brilliant sports marketing ideas ever conceived.

A flame is lit from the sun's rays beaming down on Olympia, spiritual home of the Olympic Movement.

This is then carried, insofar as is possible on foot by a team of individuals to ignite the cauldron at the site of the next Olympic Games.

And there you have it – at a stroke, the umbilical link between the Games of today and the Ancient Olympic values is established and dramatised in a way the whole world can understand.

The problem, for me, comes when this simple but profoundly symbolic message gets mixed up with other agendas.

The classic example of this came with the vainglorious and bloated format of the 2008 relay, which became a magnet for protests and a source of embarrassment for those of us who see the Olympics, at root, as a force for good in the world.

This is not a mistake that is likely to be repeated any time soon – thank goodness.


What still leaves me uneasy about the Torch Relay in its post-Beijing guise is the way in which it is being used as an excuse to take the flame on a Cook's tour to every nook and cranny of the country in which the Games are to be staged.

I can just about accept the case for the Torch to be conveyed to Glasgow, Coventry, Weymouth and other places outside London that will actually serve as sporting venues for the 2012 Olympics – especially if it is used to light the Olympic flame at those venues.

But Guernsey? The Isle of Lewis? And why on earth is the feasibility of taking the flame on "a short visit" to Dublin being explored, even if it is with "all the relevant parties"?

Of course, I am aware that a range of powerful people are extremely keen to emphasise that the 2012 Olympics can benefit the whole country and not just London.

And I can see how the Torch Relay might seem an effective vehicle for underlining this.

Nor am I so curmudgeonly as to wish that the children of Shetland have anything other than a wonderful time on the day the Olympic caravan passes through their neck of the woods.

But I still feel this is not what the Torch Relay should be for.

There is a subsidiary point, which is that the more you embellish the flame's essential journey from Olympia to London with supplementary destinations, the more the Torch Relay will cost and the more dependent you will tend to become on corporate sponsors whose agendas may further distract from the event's fundamental symbolism.

Interestingly, no fewer than nine corporate sponsors seem so far to have got their names attached to next year's Relay, either as presenting or supporting partners.

Last week's media release name-checks each of the three presenting partners six times.

In my opinion, the best way to keep the Olympic torch relay "pure" would be for Lausanne to take charge of it and for the event to be funded out of the huge sums the International Olympic Committee receives from all worldwide partners, rather than allowing particular sponsors to have their names associated with it.

The symbolism of the flame is one of the core values that sets Olympism apart from the rest of the sporting world.

It is a message important enough to be broadcast undiluted by other agendas, however well-meaning.

David Owen worked for 20 years for the Financial Times in the United States, Canada, France and the UK. He ended his FT career as sports editor after the 2006 World Cup and is now freelancing, including covering the 2008 Beijing Olympics and 2010 World Cup. Owen's Twitter feed can be accessed at www.twitter.com/dodo938

Lord Triesman's testimony in Parliament may not prove to be quite the defining moment for FIFA that the media coverage suggests. Triesman's statements have been seen as FIFA's equivalent of the International Olympic Committee's (IOC) Salt Lake City moment. That ended with the IOC cleaning up its act and expelling 10 members.

My worry is that the Triesman intervention could be great theatre but not lead to any real change.

I say this based on having witnessed an even more explosive drama at the IOC's headquarters in Lausanne back in December 1998. Then a Swiss lawyer who was in his 80s and one of the most senior IOC members, sensationally alleged that the entire Olympic Movement was corrupt.

That day was even more dramatic than Triesman's appearance in front of the House of Commons Select Committee on Culture, Media and Sport.

Yet, in the end, for all the media headlines that the Swiss lawyer, Marc Hodler, generated, it was not what he said that that led to the IOC clean up. That happened because there was hard-proven evidence of corruption which could not be challenged in court. What is more, the IOC had the will to do something about it. On both counts, the jury on FIFA is still out and looks like remaining that way for a long time.

Let us just go back to that Hodler moment.

Like FIFA now, back in 1998, the IOC was suspected of being an organisation where bidding cities could buy favours. Indeed many cities had done so. A few days before the Hodler outburst, KTVX-TV, a television station in Salt Lake City, had revealed that a scholarship had been provided to Sonia Essomba, the daughter of IOC member Rene Essomba from Cameroon, to attend university in Washington. The evidence for this was an unsigned letter from David Johnson, a leading light in the Salt Lake City bid, to Sonia saying that Salt Lake could not continue to fund her.

The letter had emerged as a result of a fall out within the Salt Lake Organising Committee with a faction wanting dirt on Johnson. For a few weeks, it seemed no more than a local story. Winter Games do not attract too much attention and Salt Lake, a Mormon city, was expected to attract even less.

So, when the IOC met for its final Executive meeting of 1998 over that December weekend, the revelation from the Salt Lake television station caused only a few ripples. Juan Antonio Samaranch, IOC President, asked Dick Pound to investigate, but it was not a major story. The IOC itself was more concerned about setting up its proposed World Anti-Doping Agency. Very few journalists were covering the meeting, so routine was it expected to be. I, personally, was there because I happened to be in Lausanne for what was then a much bigger story – UEFA, threatened by a breakaway European league, was forced to completely reshape the Champions League, allowing the big countries like England four places each.

But then, after the morning session of the IOC Executive had finished on that Saturday, December 11, Hodler (pictured) suddenly came down to the lobby where we journalists were chatting. He started telling us how deeply the IOC was mired in corruption. He had been a keen champion of Salt Lake, he was worried that the 2002 Games might now be taken away from the city. He asserted that corruption was endemic in the Olympic Movement. What is more, he said that the IOC was to blame. "The cities are the victims not the villains."

We had the feeling that we were hearing hidden secrets that we were not meant to. Holder gave the appearance of a man who had carried this dreadful secret for too long and wanted to unburden himself. For such a senior IOC member, one who had unsuccessfully stood against Samaranch for the IOC Presidency, to say this was sensational. The reaction of the IOC hierarchy added to the drama.

Up on the executive floor, Samaranch could not believe what was going on and orders went out to muzzle Hodler. It led the irate Swiss gesturing as if a muzzle were being put on a dog. This unscripted performance ended with him being led away from the journalists by a top IOC official, Francoise Zweifel, as if Hodler was her old uncle who had lost his way.

However, his intervention meant IOC corruption, long suspected, could no longer be pushed under the carpet. The IOC knew it had to do something and, to its credit, it did. Within months, the Pound Commission found enough evidence to enable the IOC to act.

But this is crucial. The evidence came not from Hodler, but from the documented proof, provided by Salt Lake City, which the guilty IOC members could not contest. Pound, in his memoirs, Inside the Olympics, has described how, when Hodler came before his commission, he could provide no proof. "To our astonishment he had no facts whatsoever and...he had been speaking solely from hearsay," Pound wrote. "Furthermore, much of the corruption that he was ranting about turned out to relate to the Ski Federation of which he had been President during the entire period that the impugned conduct had apparently occurred."

Indeed, the Hodler drama was to have a strange sequel. Many of Hodler's stories concerned wrong-doing by the Agnelli family with Ferraris being given away so Italy could host the World Ski Championships. Reporting the Hodler outburst, one of the doyens of Olympic journalism, the Italian Gianni Merlo, speculated that he was trying to damage Turin's bid for the 2006 Winter Games and help the Swiss city of Sion. The next day in the IOC lobby, Hodler confronted Merlo and called him names. Merlo successfully sued and collected damages from Hodler.

Triesman's allegations are more than hearsay. But they are still his word against that of FIFA Executive members and, unlike Hodler, Triesman made the allegations long after he left the Football Association. Had he done so while still leading the England bid, it might have destroyed the bid, but made more of an impact in cleaning up FIFA. He can now be presented as a football failure trying to get his own back as Jack Warner, one of Treisman's targets, has already claimed.

The other crucial difference with the IOC is that it had to act to protect its business. It was worried that sponsors might walk away. Following the Holder bombshell, Michael Payne, then IOC marketing director, flew to Atlanta to talk to Coke, a sponsor since 1928 and the Amsterdam Games, to make sure they stayed. There was much worry about insurance company John Hancock, whose chief executive David D'Alessandro, said: "If they fail to investigate, the rings will not be tarnished, they will be broken. A failure to do so will cost the IOC its golden aura and the Olympics will become a mere mortal like the NBA and NFL."

And this is the key to whether something emerges to change FIFA as a result of this latest corruption story. FIFA, unlike the IOC, is a mere sporting mortal. It demonstrated this over the ISL saga. That story of FIFA and the relationship with its former marketing company after nearly a decade has left many unanswered questions. And, with the investigations in Switzerland now concluded, they may never be answered.

During that saga, we did not hear a peep from FIFA's sponsors. Unlike the IOC, FIFA's sponsors, which also include Coke, do not, it seems, care about these stories of alleged corruption. FIFA, like the IOC, understands money. If change is to come, then it is the money men who must do the talking. When they do, FIFA will be forced to act.

Not till then.

Mihir Bose is one of the world's most astute observers on politics in sport and, particularly, football. He formerly wrote for The Sunday Times and The Daily Telegraph and until recently was the BBC's head sports editor

www.mihirbose.com

http://twitter.com/mihirbose

The announcement last week of the ticketing strategy for the London 2012 Paralympic Games was another very important milestone in the journey to what will be a fantastic and once in a lifetime event on these shores. LOCOG's inventive and inclusive approach is geared towards maximising the number of people able to go and watch what will be incredibly high class competition across twenty different sports in not much more than a year's time.

As our athletes continue their preparations they know that the eyes of the nation will be on them next year, and while that brings pressure it also undoubtedly helps to drive success. A UK Sport study in 2009 suggested that there is an uplift of 25 per cent in performance when athletes compete on home soil, in front of passionate home support.

That is why it is vital that we try and give our athletes as much experience of home competition before London, and it is this that has driven UK Sport's National Lottery funded Major Events programme across 2011. In both Olympic and Paralympic sports, UK Sport has sought to ensure that as many events come to these shores as possible over the year.

As a result, the UK is set to host a record number of major international Paralympic events in preparation for the Games. Next week sees the BT sponsored Paralympic World Cup, an event that UK Sport is not involved in supporting but which is absolutely part of the Paralympic calendar and provides competition for athletics, swimming and wheelchair basketball athletes. It kicks off a summer where there will then be the opportunity to see nine different Paralympic Sports in towns and cities all across Britain.

To give some highlights, the events that UK Sport is funding kick off with the Disability Sailing World Championships which is taking place in July at the London 2012 venue in Weymouth. Among many other prospects, Britain's reigning world champions, Niki Birrell and Alexandra Rickham (pictured), will be defending their titles in the SKUD class.


Then in August, Britain's reigning world and Paralympic champions in the sports of boccia and disability athletics will be showcasing their talents in major international championships on home soil. Fresh from their success earlier this year at the IPC World Championships in New Zealand, where 38 medals were won by British athletes, including 12 golds, UK Athletics will be hosting the London Disability Athletics Grand Prix on the August 6.

Two weeks later, Belfast is the venue for the Boccia World Cup, the sport's premier international event of 2011. Hosted by the University of Ulster between August 18 and 26, GB Boccia is targeting two to four medals at the event, providing ideal preparation for our athletes almost exactly a year out from London.

In addition to these three high profile world events, UK Sport's Lottery funded programme is also helping to bring these other events to the UK this year:

Sitting Volleyball Continental Cup

British Open in Disability Table Tennis

Visually Impaired Judo European Championships

Disability Shooting World Cup

Wheelchair Rugby GB Cup

Para-Archery Paralympic Qualification (UK Sport support still to be confirmed)

In addition to the athletes, of course these events also help support staff to prepare: coaches, physios, psychologists and all the other experts that surround a modern athlete equally need to be confident that they can handle the pressure and expectation of a home Games. Officials, judges and volunteers benefit from the experience too, as does the region where the event is held. Across all the Olympic and Paralympic events supported by the programme, UK Sport estimates that its Lottery investment can help to return five times as much to the local economy.

Above all else, however, the truly exciting element is the exposure that Paralympic sport will receive. I should declare an interest here: in July it is my privilege to take over as chief executive of the British Paralympic Association. I am committed to working with everyone at ParalympicsGB to ensure that we use the power of London 2012 not just to ensure athletes success at the Games but also to raise awareness of the incredible achievement and inspiration of the athletes and hopefully change people's attitudes to disability and the opportunities that Paralympic sport can provide.

I am really looking forward to the challenge, and to attending many of the events I have highlighted above to see our athletes in action. The summer of Paralympic sport we are about to witness across the UK is the perfect set up for what we all hope and expect will be a truly memorable Games next year, and the start of a new era for our sports and athletes.

Tim Hollingsworth is chief operating officer at UK Sport and set to become ParalympicsGB chief excutive in July

Usually news of the appointment of a politician, or ex- politician, to meaningful office in sport triggers a deep groan from this corner.

But I make an exception in the case of Andy Reed, the former Labour MP for Loughborough who has just been named as the new chair of the Sport and Recreation Alliance (SRA), the CCPR that was.

It is an inspired move. Reed is one of the good guys of politics, who should have been a Sports Minister but for the respective intransigence of Blair and Brown,

He knows the subject inside out but was overlooked first for Richard Caborn and then Gerry Sutcliffe despite his outstanding credentials.

Reed narrowly lost his seat at the last Election, unfortunate for him but rather fortunate for sport as it has freed him up to succeed the doughty Brigid Simmons, who steps down in July baving served the maximum term in office.

She, together with chief executive Tim Lamb, the former head honcho at the England Cricket Board, and her immediate predecessor Howard Wells, did a sterling job in resuscitating the old CCPR, which had become increasingly anachronistic since the heady and purposeful days of the well-remembered Nigel Hook. It is re-emerging as the potent ginger group it once was.

Reed, with his genuine feel for sport at all levels, will enhance its reputation and effectiveness. A former runner, volleyball and tennis player who still turns out for his Midlands rugby club, Birstall, at 50, he is popular with sports leaders and principled enough to have resigned from the Government over the Iraq war.

The one-time aide to Kate Hoey shares the same passion for community and schools sport.

Reed was always a strident voice for sport in his 13 years in Parliament, once telling fellow MPs to run a mile – which they did in support of Sport Relief.

He chaired East Midlands Sport in 2000–2003 and also chairs the National Strategic Partnership for Volunteers in Sport.

Not a bad sporting CV for a politico who is now director of his own advocacy company, SajeImpact, advising sports bodies on their dealings with Government.

He is also a committed Christian working for the Bible Society on their engagement in China.

He says: "It's a cliché in these situations to say what a great honour it is to be asked to chair an organisation like the SRA – but it genuinely is. Sport plays an incredibly important part in our society and, as of July, I will be leading an organisation that brings together no fewer than 320 national governing and representative bodies, 150,000 clubs and millions of participants. That really is something to look forward to."


Reed's popularity in sporting circles will, stand him in good stead for the role leading what considers itself sport's own 'parliament'.

Getting back to the real thing, I admit to emitting one of those groans precisely a year ago on hearing that the new Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport was to be Jeremy Hunt, someone with no known affection for sport and whose only attributed contribution to athleticism was dancing the lambada.

Yet he was to be the boss of the eminently capable Sports Minister Hugh Robertson at the DCMS and ostensibly in political charge of overseeing the greatest sporting event Britain has ever experienced, the 2012 Olympics.

Oh dear, I thought. Another Tory toff (at least I think that's the T-word I used).There will be trouble ahead...

But I have changed my mind. Hunt is ok.

The thing about sport is that quite often when you come at it from outside it has the propensity to grab you by the proverbials.

That seems to have happened in Hunt's case.

For him the road to Damascus has been via Stratford.

I think he has fallen in love with the game - and the Games.

I was certainly impressed when he was guest of the Sports Lobby Group (a collection of we journos who scribble on sports politics) at a informal London dinner recently.

He talked cogently and quite passionately about the problems of football governance,his aspirations for an all-time best Olympics and of his desire to make the revamped UK School Games his own baby, a resounding success.

The Charterhouse-educated son of a naval officer admits: "When I first took the DCMS brief in opposition it is true to say that the thing I knew least about was sport. But I have found I enjoy it the most of all my portfolio.

"It has completely blown me away, especially since becoming aware how incredibly powerful it is as a tool to inspire young people. I now have the zeal of a convert.

"I would never claim I am going to win a pub quiz on sport but I hope that people will be able to see my commitment to it by what I have done."

An example of that commitment is that to rectify virtually knowing sweet FA about football he has undertaken a refereeing course and is now awaiting the signal to take charge of his first match - will he thinks is likely to be a schoolgirl game.

Hunt is said to be one of the most ambitious men in the Coalition team and there is no certainty he will be in the same job when the Olympics come around -though he says he wants to be.

Rumours persist that he is about to be promoted to replace under-fire Andrew Lansley as Health Secretary. By coincidence this was a move made by his Labour predecessor Andy Burnham just as he was shaping up as a decent DCMS overlord.

We shall see,

Incidentally it was Hunt who, I am told, insisted on Labour's Olympics Minister Tessa Jowell remaining on the LOCOG board, believing a political balance essential and that she had a worthy contribution to make.

And according to insiders it was he, aided by Robertson, who played a pivotal role in getting the partial about-turn over the plans to slash funding for school sports.

Reed and Hunt may come from different sides of the parliamentary, social and sporting spectrum but they seem two of a kind.

It certainly makes a change to be able to say that a couple of sport's leading men from the political stage seem to be playing the game.

Alan Hubbard is an award-winning sports columnist for The Independent on Sunday, and a former sports editor of The Observer. He has covered a total of 16 Summer and Winter Olympics, 10 Commonwealth Games, several football World Cups and world title fights from Atlanta to Zaire.

The organisers of the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games have, from day one, been adamant that the Games were for the whole of the UK, not just London. Ensuring ways of demonstrating that is a key part of their strategy now and for the positive legacy that we all hope 2012 leaves behind.

The announcement of the Olympic Torch Relay route was a very important milestone in the story. The fact that its 8,000 mile route will take in cities in all four countries of the UK and be within one hour's travel time of 95 per cent of the population is fantastic, and is bound to generate excitement across the UK over the coming year and in particular in the build up to the Games when the relay takes place.

Those living in the West of England will be especially pleased by the fact that some of the region's most iconic venues are being included. The stage that will take in landmarks from Taunton to Bristol in particular will bring a tremendous uplift in excitement about the Games across the Region.

The Torch Rela in isolation however would do little to leverage the real power of the Games. The truth is that to ensure a genuine regional impact, and build a meaningful legacy from both the Olympics and Paralympics, there needs to be a more systematic and wide ranging approach to the opportunity.

That is certainly what we have sought to achieve in my part of the world. As the MP for Bath, I am co-chair, with Tim Hollingsworth of UK Sport, of "Team West of England" - a unique partnership of sport, business, the arts, education and local government that has come together to drive benefits from the Games in the unitary authority areas of Bristol, Bath and North East Somerset, South Gloucestershire and North Somerset.

The partnership has been going for well over three years now, with activity delivered by Wesport, the County Sport Partnership for the region, and can already claim a number of genuine successes. We were instrumental in bidding for and then leading the delivery of the 2008 Bristol and Bath UK School Games, which saw 15,000 children take part and generated an estimated £2 million for the local economy. Team West of England has been equally engaged with the securing of teams coming to the region for their preparation camps, with the Bristol-Kenya Partnership and, of course, the British Paralympic Association basing itself in Bath for its main preparation camp two excellent examples.

Team West of England has been involved in the creation of a West of England Athlete Support scheme, that links in Sports Aid funding, and which operates across the whole of the West of England and provdies "Free Access" to facilities schemes for National Standard athletes.

Alongside the sport, the partnership, with support from the RELAYS project (Regional Educational Legacy in Arts and Youth Sport), has created important information flows for local businesses to understand how to bid for 2012 related contracts, and how to access 2012 resources from other regional organisations keen to exploit the power of the Games.

The Partnership also promotes the opportunities created through LOCOG's official channels – such as the Get Set schools programme, involving over 200 local schools who are engaged in large part thanks to Team West of England's promotion. We have also engaged with the Inspire programme which has recognised many of the projects in our area, including the Destination London, Be Inspired, Get Involved volunteer programme, which is providing free training to volunteers in the West of England.

What this shows is that the Games can motivate and inspire beyond the performance of our elite athletes. I am convinced that this excitement will continue to grow over the next year, with the Torch Relay providing a fantastic centre piece for interest and engagement from every area of society. The Team West of England partnership will continue to play its part – building on its work so far to continue to promote sporting events and training camp opportunities, and working with schools and local businesses to ensure that they maximise their engagement.

As someone who has supported the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games coming to London from day one of the bid, I am thrilled by the progress being made in the city and by the prospect of the incredible event that will take place across July, August and September next year. But I am even more excited by the fact that, through the partnerships and joint working it has inspired, the Games have had a meaningful impact on the local economy and society that I represent. That is a proper legacy of which everyone involved should be proud.

For more information visit click here. 

Don Foster is the MP for Bath and co-chair of Team West of England

Following the most successful World Championships in the history of British taekwondo, it's hard not to reflect on how far the sport has come in recent times and to remember that only ten years ago, the elite athlete programme was being developed and managed from the back bedroom of its volunteer performance manager's semi-detached.

I'm pleased to say that, despite a somewhat rocky road on the way to 2011, these are exciting times for GB Taekwondo, the organisation charged with the preparation, management and performance of elite British athletes such as our newly crowned world champion Sarah Stevenson (pictured below) and our Youth Olympic gold medallist Jade Jones.

Over the last nine months or so we have made great strides in terms of improving facilities, infrastructure, public profile and corporate governance. In addition we have continued to liaise closely with Sport England and UK Sport and have secured additional funding for both performance and development whilst Manchester City Council's support in securing our future in their great sporting city is invaluable.

All this of course has taken up a huge amount of management time and it would have been easy to lose sight of our key objective in 2011 which was to deliver World Championship success, and in particular meet our UK Sport target of between one and three medals. As scrutiny increases across all Olympic and Paralympic sports in the build up to 2012, particularly on levels of performance in elite competition, it is important that efforts on the field of play are balanced with the work being done "backstage" to capture this once in a lifetime opportunity to safeguard the future of our respective sports. To deliver on our key objective, whilst moving forward with other activities which are key to the longer term development and security of GB Taekwondo, is credit to all concerned.

Long term sustainability is as important to us as short-term World and Olympic success and whilst our athletes have been challenging the established world order in Gyeongju, Korea, we have been rolling out the first in a number of junior talent initiatives, in partnership with Sport England, in the search for our future stars of 2016 and 2020.

The establishment of a development pathway for the sport alongside other initiatives such as last year's "Fighting Chance" talent transfer programme should ensure that we are well placed to build upon our Olympic bronze won by Stevenson in Beijing in 2008 and any further success next year in London.


It goes without saying that our rapid growth cannot be underpinned by the provision of lottery funds, exchequer and local Government support alone. Our Business Services partner KPMG have provided invaluable support through their CSR programme and have helped our development into what I firmly believe is an extremely attractive proposition for major commercial investors to become involved with a fast growing sport which not is only well placed for success in 2012 but also at a grassroots level provides that magic formula of activity, respect and discipline that is so important to youth development in today's society.

Our GB team are taking a well earned rest before training begins in earnest again in June and we'll see them in action again at our British International Open in Manchester in October.

With the European Championships also scheduled for Manchester next May, just weeks before London's opening ceremony, it's going to be a busy 15 months or so for GB Taekwondo but you can rest assured that we'll continue to keep kicking above our weight.

Jeremy Beard is the chairman of GB Taekwondo

The ticket sellers outside the Shanghai Stadium on Sunday cut straight to the chase in their efforts to attract passing trade for the impending Samsung Diamond League athletics meeting.

"Liu Xiang! Liu Xiang!" was their only shout.

For the 30,000 or so spectators who turned up, there was no doubt about the main attraction. They were there to see the local hero, Shanghai's favourite son, attempt to reclaim the territory he once occupied at the peak of the sport.

At 27, Liu Xiang is accustomed to large stadiums packed with home expectation. Having had it all as a high hurdler – Olympic and world titles, world record, the lot – he has also had the sensation of seeing it all go as an Achilles tendon injury proved to be a barrier he could not surmount.

His pained inability to carry through with an opening 110 metres hurdles heat at the 2008 Beijing Games provoked widespread dismay among the millions of his fellow Chinese who had come to expect nothing but success from their golden boy.

Many spectators at the Bird's Nest stadium were in tears afterwards, including Liu Xiang's coach as he apologised for the disappointment at a press conference.

Still uncertain about the extent of his recovery, Liu expressed limited ambitions on the eve of the last year's Shanghai meeting, where he was beaten not just by the American who had taken his place at the top of the event, David Oliver, but also by fellow Chinese athlete Dongpeng Li.

This time round, however, the dynamic was different at the pre-event press conference which brought Liu and Oliver together. Liu maintained that his main target would be to try and get as close to the American, whose unbeaten run outdoors stretched back to August 2009, and had "no expectation of overtaking him," adding that he wished Oliver could stay in Shanghai for longer so her could learn from him.

At which point the burly resident of Orlando, Florida, grew serious.

"Liu doesn't need to learn anything from me," Oliver said. "He's already been where I'm trying to go. He's got the gold medals and the world record. That's something I haven't achieved yet."

Then Liu, patting him on his mighty shoulder, insisted with a grin: "You will have them. Be patient!"

There was a sense that Liu was in control of the press conference, just as, the following day, he was to control his race from start to finish in clocking a world-leading time of 13.07sec which indicated that, if he was not yet back at his peak – his former world record stood at 12.88 – then he is well out of the foothills.

Before the last race of the night, the crowd had responded with enthusiasm on numerous occasions, notably – and strangely – in following the progress of the javelin throwers' warm-up efforts, roaring their appreciation as each practice effort soared and landed.

For a while it was reminiscent of the US spectators at the 1994 World Cup finals who whooped their appreciation of the distance gained by goalkeepers' drop kicks.

But when the gun went the quality of sound in the Shanghai Stadium altered to the point where it buzzed in the ear. There was that unmistakeable intensity about the race, a race where the home hope established his lead and, gloriously, floated home with a radiant smile as his powerful opponent laboured to keep in touch.


There was pandemonium in the aftermath as our hero was mobbed by blue-bibbed photographers who switched and turned to stay with him like a shoal of fish, occasionally knocking each other to the ground in their eagerness.

After an extended lap of honour, Liu's face was irradiated by TV lights as he gave the first of a series of animated interviews, finally disappearing from view with a wave which drew squeals of excitement from the many young female spectators who had crammed forward in the stand above him to catch every detail of his activities.

By the time Liu got to the post-race press conference much of that animation had worn down, although he was lively in comparison to the normally ebullient American who now sat rather grimly beside him.

It was not just a good night for Liu, but a bad night for Oliver – as both men were subsequently to maintain.

"I don't think David was at his best tonight," Liu said. "He seemed nervous. He wasn't relaxed. But for us we just try to enjoy the competition."

It may have been the translation, but it seemed almost as if Liu was still in competition, and still enjoying it.

Oliver will soon run much faster than he did on Sunday, and if he gets down to his best of 12.89, set during his unbeaten outdoor season last year, it is far from certain that Liu will be able to match him.

But competition is not all about times, as this marquee event demonstrated. Competition is also about minds.

Asked if he felt he could return to the Olympic podium in London 2012, Liu looked very thoughtful for a moment, before responding: "If the luck is with me."

He cannot control that – but it looks like he is doing a good job on all the things he can control.

Mike Rowbottom, one of Britain's most talented sportswriters, has covered the last five Summer and four Winter Olympics for The Independent. Previously he has worked for the Daily Mail, The Times, The Observer, the Sunday Correspondent and The Guardian. He is now chief feature writer for insidethegames

While it may be unfathomable to some now, I was once a half-decent rugby player.

In fact once upon a time, it was my dream to make it as a professional rugby player.

Sheer physiology unfortunately dictated that such an occurrence would never materialise but still, I have had relative success on a small scale in the sport. I was part of a formidable school side that went two years without losing a game on route to winning three Essex Schools Championships and four Essex Sevens titles.

I also represented the University of Bedfordshire 1st XV on several occasions which one could consider a pretty decent standard.

But it does not quite represent the heights of playing for England.

It was therefore with some excitement that I recently opened an email inviting the media to train with the England rugby sevens team on the hallowed turf at Twickenham Stadium.

While 15-a-side rugby remains the dominant form of the game, rugby sevens has risen steadily in popularity over the years.

It has become a key feature of the Commonwealth Games but it is fair to say that things really exploded for the sport on October 9, 2009, when during the 121st International Olympic Committee (IOC) Session in Copenhagen, it was decided that the sport would be included in the Olympic Games for Rio 2016.

With an Olympic gold medal - arguably the greatest prize in sport - now available for rugby sevens players, the sport is starting to reach a new stratosphere and I was very much looking forward to testing myself against the best players in the country.

I was arrived at Twickenham Stadium, walked past the famous Golden Lion statue I know so well, and was directed straight to the magnificent England changing room with a sense of awe.

I had seen my first match at Twickenham, unequivocally the home of rugby, when I was just 10-years-old.

The match took place on December 8, 1997, and saw England and New Zealand draw 26-26.

It was a superb game but my fondest memory was seeing giant All Black star Jonah Lomu running down the wing in full flow and it was a thrill to now have the chance to tread on the turf where he had so often devastated the world's best players.

After getting over the fact that I was actually getting changed in the England dressing room, my media colleagues and I were led out onto the pitch and put through a paces in a warm up drill by England sevens head coach Ben Ryan.


His drills were all extremely fast-paced and despite having participated over 1,000 rugby training sessions, I was starting to struggle.

I was wondering why the session was so intense before I remembered that this was sevens, not 15-a-side.

For those that don't follow the sport too closely, 15-a-side rugby is a much slower form of the game. It often involves a lot of scrums and it is where you see the "fat guys" because of their ability to push.

Rugby sevens is a whole different game. It is played on a full size pitch but as there are only seven people, they all need to be phenomenally fast, phenomenally fit and have not an ounce of fat on them.

This was abundantly clear in my warm up with the England sevens players who all looked like they were chiselled from stone.

Mercifully, the warm up did not last too long and we were split into teams which meant that each team had a few England players on them.

I quickly learnt that the key to winning our games was to pass the ball to one of our England players Dan Norton and judging by his outrageous acceleration, it looks like he must drink Formula One fuel on a regular basis.

He unsurprisingly scored all three of our sides tries before we were put up against another side which included the England sevens captain Ben Gollings.

Gollings slotted in the fly-half position and as a poorly thought through experiment, I lined up opposite him in order to see if I could catch him.

This was my moment, on the hallowed turf of Twickenham, to prove to myself I could have made it as a professional.

I saw the ball come towards Gollings and lined him up for a big hit.

The wind rushed through my ears and for a few seconds it felt like the 80,000 seat stadium was full and cheering me on.

I was just metres away from him when with barely a glance at me, Gollings stepped one way and then speed off in the other direction so quickly that I could not have touched him even if I had had a baseball bat in my hands, which I rather wanted at that point.

I was left face-first in the Twickenham turf as Gollings strolled under the posts, safe in the knowledge that it was probably a good thing I never made it professionally.

As the session drew to an end, head coach Ryan appeared to think we hadn't been humiliated enough as he made two new teams.

It was England's starting sevens team versus the seven best players from the media.

It was with a smile that I was picked in the media team but that was quickly wiped off my face from the moment the game started.

To call the match men against boys is an understatement and they were so much faster than us that we may as well have been playing against seven Ferraris.

I won't tell you the final score, but you can safely assume a lot of points were scored, none of them by us.

We marched off the field and I was left rather amazed at how spectacular the sport of rugby sevens is.

People are wondering if the world's best 15-a-side players will be drafted into sevens for the Olympics but I'm certain that a team of sevens specialists would easily beat an all-star sevens team featuring 15-a-side players.

This is because, in rugby sevens, speed kills and I learnt that the hard way.

I walked off the field and went to thank Gollings for the session.


Gollings himself will next week be leading the England team out at Twickenham Stadium in the Emirates Airline London Sevens and I wanted to also wish him luck for that.

He thanked me and said he had enjoyed the session but that he was only running at about 50 per cent as he had a niggling injury.

Considering as I could not even see the shadow of a 50 per cent Gollings, his comment was all the humiliation I needed for one day.

I quickly showered off in the immaculate Twickenham changing room showers before heading off home.

It isn't overly fun to play unless you are insanely fast and fit, but if you want to watch, you can see the England  team in action on May 21 and 22 at Twickenham Stadium in the Emirates Airline London Sevens, the latest leg in the HSBC Sevens World Series.

Tickets are available from £15 by clicking here. 

And although I'll be supporting England, it would be good to see them pick on someone their own size when the action gets underway.

Tom Degun is a reporter for insidethegames

Pictures courtsey of Richard Lane Photography