Tokyo 2021 Olympics LIVE: Latest updates as chief Toshiro Muto refuses to rule out last-minute cancellation

Tunisia’s double Olympic swimming gold medallist Oussama Mellouli has introduced his worldwide retirement, saying he had determined to “boycott” Tokyo regardless of qualifying for his sixth Video games.

The 37-year-old gained 1,500m gold within the 2008 Beijing Olympics and the open-water marathon in London 4 years later, when he additionally claimed a 1,500m bronze medal within the pool. He certified for Tokyo at an occasion in Portugal in June.

“After a month of struggling, I lose all hope of reconciliation or of successful my case. So I made a decision to retire from worldwide competitions and boycott the Tokyo Video games,” he posted on Instagram.

Mellouli didn’t give particulars however media studies referenced a long-running authorized dispute with the Tunisian swimming federation.

Competing in Tokyo would have made Mellouli, who in Beijing beat Australia’s Grant Hackett to develop into Tunisia’s first gold medallist in practically half a century, solely the fourth swimmer to compete in six Video games.

He was already the primary swimmer to win gold in each the pool and open water.

The Tunisian had deliberate to retire in 2020 however delayed that call when the Tokyo Olympics have been postponed a 12 months because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Mellouli was suspended for 18 months in 2007 after a optimistic dope check for the banned substance Adderall.

With two days to go till their opening Olympic soccer match towards hosts Japan, South Africa’s coach David Notoane stated the well being of his gamers was his primary concern after COVID-19 left their preparations in disarray.

Severely depleted by coronavirus infections and withdrawals earlier than they left for the Video games, the squad confronted additional setbacks on the weekend after two gamers and a video analyst examined optimistic in Tokyo.

“My largest concern for the time being shouldn’t be going through Japan, however is the well-being, the well being of the gamers,” Notoane advised reporters on Tuesday on the Tokyo Stadium, saying he had simply 17 gamers left to select from.

They returned to coaching on Monday after every week’s absence, giving them little or no time to acclimatise to a brand new atmosphere.

“(We’re) coming into … new climate patterns the place it’s sizzling, it’s humid. We come out of winter in South Africa,” he stated.

Pissed off however resigned to a information convention dominated by questions on COVID-19, Notoane stated his group have been grateful for the prospect to compete in Japan, on condition that “the worst-case state of affairs might have been that we’re suspended from the event”.

South Africa have been trying to fly in reinforcements for his or her remaining Group A pool matches towards France and Mexico, he added.

“Mentally it’s very powerful,” he stated. “It’s not what we got here right here for, it’s not what we anticipated. We’ve performed all the things in our energy to verify we are available in clear 100%, however it’s additionally tough to be in isolation for the time being for many of us.

“…Nonetheless, as a gaggle, we all know that we have now a possibility on Thursday.”

Athlete activism is making a comeback at these Olympic Video games.

When play begins on the Tokyo Video games on Wednesday, acts of free expression of the sort athletes have been lengthy banned from making on the Olympics will take heart stage.

The British ladies’s soccer group has pledged to take a knee earlier than kickoff towards Chile of their Olympic event opener in Sapporo, to point out help for racial justice.

“We need to present to everybody that is one thing severe,” Britain defender Demi Stokes stated. “What a strategy to do it, on an Olympic stage.”

One hour later in Tokyo, the US and Sweden ought to observe in a gesture acknowledged globally because the homicide of George Floyd 14 months in the past. The England and Italy males’s groups took a knee earlier than the European Championship ultimate this month.

What’s widespread in trendy soccer begins a brand new period for Olympic athletes greater than 50 years after the raised black-gloved fists of American sprinters Tommie Smith and John Carlos in Mexico Metropolis made them icons and pariahs.

Nonetheless, it’s a restricted freedom allowed by the Worldwide Olympic Committee, which simply this month eased its longstanding ban on all athlete protest contained in the Video games discipline of play. The change adopted two evaluations in 18 months by the IOC’s personal athletes fee which suggested towards it.

Gestures are actually allowed earlier than races and video games begin, on the sector, and at first line.

Medal podiums stay off limits for protest, and even the IOC concessions left every sport’s governing physique free to retain the ban.

Attorneys who research Rule 50 of the Olympic Constitution — that banned any form of “demonstration or political, spiritual or racial propaganda” till July 2 — see points forward with athletes and the IOC heading on a quick monitor to the Courtroom of Arbitration for Sport.

“I believe we are able to clearly anticipate some frictions round Rule 50 within the coming weeks,” sports activities legislation educational Antoine Duval stated when internet hosting a current debate on the inevitable athlete activism at Tokyo.

Olympic organisers have responded to Toshiro Muto saying he would regulate an infection numbers and maintain discussions with organisers over cancelling the Tokyo Olympics on the final second if obligatory.

Organisers of the Tokyo 2020 Olympics are absolutely concentrating on delivering a “profitable Video games”, a spokesman stated on Tuesday, after the top of the organising committee stated he didn’t rule out a cancellation of the worldwide sports activities occasion.

“We’re concentrating 100% on delivering profitable Video games,” the spokesman stated.

Shadow overseas secretary Lisa Nandy led requires a diplomatic boycott of the Winter Olympics.

She stated: “We’ve got watched because the scenario has deteriorated in Hong Kong and genocide is dedicated in Xinjiang.

“He has issued statements and launched sanctions while nonetheless clinging to the absurd prospect of boarding a airplane to Beijing subsequent 12 months to take part in a PR coup for the Chinese language authorities, asking the royal household and senior politicians to face by whereas journalists are rounded up, pro-democracy protesters are arrested and one million Uighur are incarcerated in detention camps.

“In October final 12 months, earlier than he was overruled by the Chancellor and the Prime Minister, he stated there comes a degree the place sport and politics can’t be separated.

Mr Raab replied: “The participation of any nationwide group within the Olympics is a matter for the British Olympic Affiliation.

“They’re required as a matter of legislation beneath the Worldwide Olympic Committee laws to take these selections independently.

“We’ve got led the worldwide response on Xinjiang, but additionally on Hong Kong.

“After all, as we have now stated, we might take into account what degree of Authorities illustration is on the Winter Olympics in the end.”

Don’t inform Hector Pardoe in regards to the six-foot, 450lb jellyfish which were flooding the coasts of Japan of their thousands and thousands lately as a consequence of local weather change.

The Wrexham 20-year-old, who will contest the 10km open water swimming occasion on the Tokyo Olympics, has needed to overcome his concern of the translucent giants so as to carve a profitable profession away from the pool.

Actually Pardoe, who gained the lads’s Olympic qualifier in Setubal final month to verify his place, has revealed it nearly put him off heading into the water in any respect.

Pardoe recalled: “After I certified I obtained a load of messages, and one was from a boy I used to coach with after we have been about 12 years outdated.

“He despatched me a photograph of a coaching camp in Slovenia, and he jogged my memory of how after we would go within the sea and I used to be so scared that I couldn’t even put my face within the water.

“We have been speaking about how far I’d come, from not desirous to even swim within the sea to now qualifying for a two-hour race within the sea on the Olympics.”

Pardoe switched to open water in frustration after trailing different rivals within the pool and shortly discovered he tailored higher to the altering circumstances and programs. A subsequent choice to modify his coaching to France paid off as he continued his rise via the game.

Pardoe will contest the lads’s 10km race on the Odaiba Marine Park on August 5, someday after team-mate Alice Dearing makes historical past by turning into the primary black swimmer to symbolize Nice Britain within the ladies’s race.

Pardoe admits that whereas he bears little resemblance to the 12-year-old who was reluctant to place his face within the water, his underwater wobble stays – and that isn’t supreme in a rustic which boasts the Nomura’s jellyfish, one of many largest of the species on the planet.

“I had fairly a brutal expertise with jellyfish in Malta in 2018 within the European Juniors,” remembered Pardoe. “I used to be on the entrance of the pack going via the jellyfish first, and I obtained some nasty stings up my arms for which I’ve nonetheless obtained the scars.

“If I used to be simply swimming recreationally within the sea I’d nonetheless be petrified of jellyfish, however once I’m in an open-water race now I’ve obtained a lot adrenaline and stuff, I don’t actually give it some thought.”

Keigo Oyamada, Tokyo Olympics composer, has resigned after admitting to bulling disabled classmates.

The Japanese musician, higher referred to as Cornelius, was set to play on the opening ceremony.

The controversy got here after journal interviews from the mid-Nineteen Nineties surfaced, through which he appeared to boast in regards to the incidents.

“I sincerely settle for the opinions and recommendation I’ve obtained, categorical my gratitude, and can maintain them in thoughts for my future actions and ideas,” he stated on social media. “I apologise from the underside of my coronary heart.”

Netherlands worldwide Sherida Spitse has needed to withdraw from the Olympic Video games after struggling a knee damage throughout coaching on Monday in a serious setback to Dutch hopes of gold within the ladies’s soccer event.

The 31-year-old midfielder, who has a file 188 caps for the nationwide group, is an integral a part of the Dutch facet, who’re European champions and have been Girls’s World Cup runners-up in 2019, and are among the many medal favourites in Japan.

“And instantly my large dream is shattered. There are few phrases that may describe how unbelievably painful this hurts,” Spitse advised Dutch media on Tuesday after a sort out in coaching resulted in torn ligaments.

“I at all times give 100%, additionally in duels in coaching. This was simply dangerous luck. It actually sucks, for me and for the group.”

Dutch coach Sarina Wiegman, whose group go up towards Zambia in Miyagi on Wednesday of their opening Group F encounter, had sympathy for Spitse at Tuesday’s pre-match information convention.

“Her complete life is targeted on soccer and this event. That’s painful for her, but additionally for the group. She is a vital participant for us, each on and off the sector,” stated Wiegman.

After the remainder of the squad have been advised Spitse needed to go dwelling, tears flowed. “This has a big impact on the group. However on the identical time everybody realises that we have now a purpose right here. We are able to cope with this, we have now handled setbacks earlier than,” Wiegman added.

Joelle Smits of VfL Wolfsburg will substitute Spitse. She was on a standby listing and already coaching with the squad.

Girls’s 3×3 basketball participant Katie Lou Samuelson stated she was devastated after being compelled to drag out of the Olympics on account of a optimistic COVID-19 check, regardless of being absolutely vaccinated.

USA Basketball stated on Monday that Samuelson was positioned beneath their well being and security protocols on the weekend, with Jackie Younger taking her place within the squad alongside Stefanie Dolson, Allisha Grey and Kelsey Plum.

“I’m devastated to share that after getting sick with COVID-19, I will be unable to go and compete in Tokyo,” she wrote on Instagram.

“Competing within the Olympics has been a dream of mine since I used to be slightly lady and I hope sometime quickly, I can come again to understand that dream. I’m particularly heartbroken as I’m absolutely vaccinated and took each precaution.”

3×3 basketball is making its Olympic debut in Tokyo. The three-a-side occasion runs from July 24-28.

Friday’s opening ceremony for the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Video games will happen behind closed doorways and is predicted to be a dramatically scaled-back affair.

With solely media and dignitaries current because of the risk of Covid-19.

However it has been confirmed that Japan’s Emperor Naruhito will attend.