Misplaced Vote Wins London Olympics!

[Drusilla]

A senior Olympic official, Alex Gilady (Israel) believes London only won the Olympics in 2012 because of an error in the penultimate round of voting.
The 'stray' vote should have gone to Madrid, which would have put them in equal second place with Paris. He then states Madrid would have won a tie breaker between the two and gone on to beat London in the final round. (How he knows this, I cannot answer.)
Apparently the BBC have researched this incident and back his story. It can be found on their News site.
Does this sound like sour grapes to anyone else??

[Lonnie]

To bring it up now, certainly sounds like sour grapes, but its a shame they never found out earlier, worst thing that could have happened, businesses and residents are being compulsory bought out, and you've only got to look at Olympic sites abroad, to see what happens after.

[gary baldy]

I dont understand this man's motivation - what does he hope to gain?
It is definitely a case of "what if...? and considering the outcome its more a case of "So what...?".

[Loosehead]

Madrid would not have beaten London anyway. They only had the olympics in Spain recently, if anything it would have been easier for London.

[Drusilla]

I agree Loosehead. I wouldn't have worried about Madrid winning, half as much as Paris. Happy Christmas to you all, by the way.

[WendyS]

Personally I would have been delighted if Paris or Madrid had won the Olympics. I doubt whether they will bring any financial benefit to the country. London taxpayers and others will probably be paying for the cost of them for years to come.

[Drusilla]

Hi Wendy. I was born and bred in Hackney and anything that can help to improve that place is worth paying by all Londoners.
I think Olympic bids have to include a plan to show the long term benefits to an area, post games. I remember the trouble in Barcelona and my father told me the people of Montreal suffered terrible financial hardship back in the eighties as a result of a winning bid.
I hope I'm not wrong on this.

[jno]

Barcelona's doing fine: since the Olympics, and with the help of the tourism and the urban regeneration they provided it's become one of the most interesting world cities to visit. Montreal, on the other hand, is probably still being paid off. The turning point was LA in 1984: the whole thing was run by a businessman on business lines, and dedicated to the prospect of making money (this may sound like greedy commercialism, but it's better than losing money, which others did); and others have followed suit. To win the games, you're supposed to show that they will bring long-term benefit to local people. This doesn't often work out - even Sydney has white elephant stadiums left over - but there's no reason in principle why it shouldn't. I wish I trusted the UK government to do it right.

As to the fat-finger vote: who knows? Who cares? It could be true, but gary baldy is right - it just doesn't matter now.

[Loosehead]

Every Olympics since 1976 has been run on commercial lines. Get with the program Wendy!