The closer the Olympic Games get, the more concrete the problems associated with it become.

In view of the increasing number of infections in Tokyo, of all things, the usually glamorous self-portrayal of the hosts, the opening ceremony, could take place with the exclusion of spectators.

A year ago, when the games were postponed due to the pandemic, the idea was still in the room to use this opportunity to celebrate the triumph of humanity over the corona virus.

Evi Simeoni

Sports editor.

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    The largest Japanese daily newspaper "Yomiuri Shimbun" reported on Sunday that the seats could remain empty at the big ceremony on July 23rd.

    On July 8th, the organizing committee will discuss this issue again with the government, the city administration and the International Olympic and Paralympic Committees.

    Spectators could also be excluded from some of the competitions.

    Foreign visitors to the games are already unloaded.

    335 Russian athletes to Japan

    Another corona case was discovered among the increasing number of foreign athletes arriving who want to acclimate themselves in training camps in Germany. The Japanese government announced that a member of the Serbian team tested positive for the coronavirus on arrival at Haneda Airport in Tokyo on Saturday. The person was isolated, four companions were brought to an accommodation near the airport. A spokesman for the city of Nanto, the target of the five-man team, said they were rowers. Previously, two members of the Ugandan Olympic team had tested positive, one of whom was only discovered in the training camp. It was proven that they were infected with the particularly infectious Delta variant.

    The difficulties inherent in sport are now also taking on more concrete forms. For example, the Russian Olympic Committee (ROC) announced that it would send 335 athletes to the Tokyo Games - 50 more than at the 2016 Games in Rio, when Russian athletes only rushed to meet certain conditions due to the evidence relating to state doping Examination by the world federations were approved. This time Russia is banned by the World Anti-Doping Agency, as a consequence of the fact that manipulated data sets should prevent further clarification of the state doping.

    Russian athletes have to start as “neutral athletes”, but they are easily recognizable. The volleyball player Maxim Michailow and the fencer Sofia Velikaja will carry the ROC flag into the stadium, the team clothing will bear the ROC logo. An excerpt from Tchaikovsky's First Piano Concerto serves as the hymn. These conditions were made by the International Sports Court, which halved the entire ban from four years to two.

    Meanwhile, the South Sea island state of Samoa, among whose 200,000 inhabitants there has so far only been one case of Covid-19, has canceled its weightlifters for fear of being introduced. A total of eleven athletes from Samoa qualified for the Games, but only three weightlifters actually lived in the archipelago, said Patrick Fepulea'i, president of the National Olympic Committee. The other athletes live in Australia and New Zealand, one is already in Japan. These seven athletes are allowed to participate. Fepulea'i relied on a government decision, the logic of which he fully understood. "Especially the need to protect Samoa from the virus, especially the new variant that is now spreading around the world," said Fepulea'i.