As another incredible Olympic Games draws to a close on Sunday, it’s clear again why the quadrennial showpiece is the greatest sporting spectacle of them all, writes IOL Sport’s Michael Sherman.
This is not a title I throw around lightly, and in fact, I believe the Olympics is better than the rugby and Fifa World Cups combined.
Of course, soccer is the most popular sport in the world, with 1.5 billion people tuning in on TV to watch the 2022 Fifa World Cup (Fifa2022). The 2023 Rugby World Cup (RWC2023) was measured in viewing hours, with 1.33 billion viewing hours recorded across the globe. The Tokyo Olympics had poor viewership figures which were due to the height of the Covid pandemic and limited numbers of fans at events, but the Beijing Olympics in 2008 recorded 4.7 billion viewers worldwide.
The vast majority of the viewers of soccer and rugby are fans of those sports, while a small percentage of people watching are new to the sport in those World Cups.
Something for everyone
The Olympics, though, has something for everyone - and that’s including soccer and rugby (sevens). In total, the Olympics features 32 sports. That’s game, set and match right there. Yes, there’s also tennis at the Olympics.
It’s not a stretch to say there might be some similarly big personalities on display at the Paris Olympics than at Fifa2022 and RWC2023. It’s difficult to compete with the draws of people like Cristiano Ronaldo and Siya Kolisi. I may be slightly biased, but there’s little comparison to the sportsmanship and humility of Kolisi and Ronaldo. But this is not a story about the arrogance of someone like Ronaldo.
Arrogance in sport though, is a hot topic of debate. It’s often said, though I don’t agree, that arrogance is excused if you can back it up with performances.
On that topic, it would be remiss not to mention Noah Lyles. The newly-crowned 100m Olympic champion talks the talk, before walking the walk. Who can forget when he came under fire from basketball fans when he said “You know the thing that hurts me the most is that I have to watch the NBA finals and they have ‘World Champion’ on their head … World Champion of what? The United States? Don’t get me wrong, I love the US, at times, but that ain’t the world.”
Expanding egos
Lyles made the comments after he was crowned world champion in the 100m, 200m and 4x100m relays at the World Championships last year in Budapest.
Flash forward to Paris, and after picking up his new 100m crown at the Olympics, his ego rose to new heights. The 100m is widely regarded as the marquee event of the Olympics, and the French organisers certainly saw to it that it was treated like that.
The eight runners in the men’s final came out one-by-one like gladiators in a Roman Colosseum, as the lights were dimmed in the stadium before working the crowd into a crescendo before the start of the race in the hallowed arena.
Winning that incredible race served to only increase the already massive ego of Lyles. SA’s Akani Simbine even proved to be the toast of a nation despite finishing fourth in the race, such was the nature of the phenomenal photo finish.
He came out in the final of the men’s 200m on Thursday night celebrating like he’d already won the forthcoming race as he played to the crowd.
Up stepped Botswana’s Letsile Tebogo - whose surname seemingly can’t be pronounced correctly by Olympic commentators - as he powered to victory to upset Lyles’ fairytale at the Olympics. Lyles still managed bronze though, but it was hardly the medal he was seeking. It also turned out he was battling Covid, as he confirmed after the race when he had to be escorted off the track in a wheelchair.
Of course you also get great sporting performances produced by athletes without a hint of the ego of people like Lyles, like those in the swimming pool of Tatjana Smith. The 27-year-old has stepped away from competitive swimming after becoming South Africa’s most decorated Olympic athlete with four medals. Her two golds and two silvers came over the 100m and 200m breaststroke, and will remain the pride and inspiration of Mzansi for many generations to come. Her flood of emotion after she won her final medal was testament to the hard work Smith put in to reach such great heights.
🫡 𝕋ℍ𝔸ℕ𝕂 𝕐𝕆𝕌 𝕋𝔸𝕋𝕁𝔸ℕ𝔸 🫡
— SABC Sport (@SABC_Sport) August 1, 2024
🗣️ "𝙸 𝚌𝚘𝚞𝚕𝚍𝚗'𝚝 𝚑𝚊𝚟𝚎 𝚊𝚜𝚔𝚎𝚍 𝚏𝚘𝚛 𝚊 𝚋𝚎𝚝𝚝𝚎𝚛 𝚠𝚊𝚢 𝚝𝚘 𝚎𝚗𝚍 𝚖𝚢 𝚌𝚊𝚛𝚎𝚎𝚛..."
🇿🇦 #TeamSA's Tatjana Smith announces her retirement following her impressive run at the #Olympics #Paris2024!#SABCSportOlympics pic.twitter.com/hpeFqMfkfU
Don’t like sport? No problem
And that’s what makes the Olympics the greatest show of them all. Not only do you have the polarising personalities and performances in one sport, but in all of them. If athletics isn’t your thing, you can turn to the rhythmic gymnastics or sport climbing, or even thousands of kilometres (15,000km to be exact) away from Paris you can catch the Olympic surfing in Tahiti. Or breaking (break dancing), or golf or judo.
And anyone who has watched the Paris Olympics will know One Hand in my Pocket is not just an Alanis Morissette song, but the shooting style of a now viral Turkish silver medallist by the name of Yusuf Dikec. The list of sporting codes is seemingly endless.
And if any sport whatsoever is not your thing, there’s the opening and closing ceremony.
The opening ceremony of the Paris Olympics on July 26 is still being talked about, and now Hollywood actor Tom Cruise is expected to perform some crazy stunt at the closing ceremony on Sunday. He probably won’t even make the big headlines, as the French seem to have a way of grabbing the attention of the world through their outlandish expressionism anyway.
Simply put, the Olympics is the whole package - and it is so much more than who won gold.
In fact, in few other sports is it such an incredible achievement to finish second or third at a major event. Some ardent rugby and soccer fans have trouble understanding this concept, and that’s probably because they don’t take an active interest in the Olympics. But for those who do, it’s an unforgettable few weeks every four years - and nothing else comes close.
* The views expressed are not necessarily the views of IOL or Independent Media.
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