Why these sports ?

[Bazile]

The Olympics should be the pinnacle of your chosen sport, and for many it is. But it is plainly obvious that the football and tennis Olympic competitions don't matter nearly as much to the players as other big events they play in.

So , why is tennis / football ( and soon to be golf ) included in the olympics ?

[emmie]

no idea frankly, i wouldn't have football or tennis in the Olympics, nor synchronised swimming. As to golf, really, that is just stupid.

[mushroom25]

not sure about tennis - but in the case of football, the olympics is just another opportunity for premier league clubs' very expensive assets to get injured, and with no possibility of a financial return as recompense.

[EDDIE51]

For Tennis the highest pinnacle is to win Wimbledon or the French Open, for football it is the World cup . These are the things that really matter to these sports , the Olympics are just a side line to tennis and football players.

[Mick-Talbot]

Why not tennis ?

It has as much right to be in the olympics as table tennis and badminton.

[Duncer]

Andy Murray seemed pretty pleased?

[diddlydo]

Football can't be taken seriously as GB doesn't field the strongest possible team. Tennis wasn't attracting all the top players when it was first re-introduced to the games but now it does so tennis counts. Forget women's boxing (yuk!), beach volleyball and synchronised swimming.

[emmie]

diddly, perhaps you haven't watched it, unless you are told by the commentators that these are women, from a distance you wouldn't know. They are very able fighters, and quite frankly the term yuck shouldn't be used. I watched a British fighter then a few other bouts and the standard of boxing was excellent. Perhaps you don't like men boxing either. I happen to like both. the women have spent a long time getting equality in the boxing ring. Well done to them.

[sandyRoe]

And why was bicycle polo, in which Ireland once won gold, discontinued?

[emmie]

no idea, to each his own.

[bibblebub]

bring back poodle clipping

[FredPuli43]

Quite bibble, poodle clipping and also town planning, which QI said was once in the Olympics. Milton Keynes and gold, anyone?
If the Ryder Cup is anything to go by, the best players in golf would compete and do so with great enthusiasm. But golf is not a team game, but one for individuals, and that makes it appropriate .

Soccer shouldn't be there not because it's a team game; team games in themselves seem inappropriate in the Olympics; but because the teams don't represent the best in their countries, a lot of the best being excluded by age .