Rogge: Put athletes first

Rogge gave his advice to London's team

Olympic chief Jacques Rogge has told Prime Minister Tony Blair that London must make athletes' requirements a priority if its bid for the 2012 Games is to succeed.

The International Olympic Committee president met Blair, London mayor Ken Livingstone, culture secretary Tessa Jowell and London's bid chairman Barbara Cassani on Monday.

He stressed that the decision on 2012 would be made on the technical qualities of the bid, with security being a major issue.

Rogge: Beckham won't help bid

And he reiterated that Cassani should concentrate on those issues instead of using high-profile figures such as David Beckham to raise London's profile.

"The Prime Minister gave a strong commitment of support from the government," said Rogge.

"He was interested in knowing the IOC's list of priorities. He's keenly interested in supporting the best prepared bid. I found a very strong determination there.

We might well end up with no candidate cities eliminated at the cut IOC chief Jacques Rogge

"We are concerned first about the quality of a bid. If you look at what are essential elements in the bid I would put security first.

"Since 1972 and Munich we know the Games can be a target for terrorist groups, we didn't have to wait until September 11 to know that it is a possible target.

"After that the comfort of the athletes, a good transport network and an urban and sporting legacy."

Rogge said one of London's assets was its cultural diversity as a cosmopolitan city.

"That was one of the trump cards of Vancouver [the 2010 winter Games host]," he said. "London could play that card."

London is one of nine cities bidding for 2012 with Rio de Janeiro the latest to commit to a line-up featuring New York, Paris, Madrid, Moscow, Leipzig, Istanbul and Havana.

Rio enters 2012 race

Rogge has described the list of candidates as the strongest Olympic bidding field in history.

A decision will be made by the 126 IOC members in Singapore on July 6 2005.

And Rogge said all nine could be retained until the final round of voting rather than cutting the field to a shortlist of finalists in May 2004.

"The cut will be very minimal," he said. "Potentially we could have all nine cities or six or seven. We might well end up with no candidate cities eliminated at the cut."

Rogge disputed the theory that IOC decisions on host cities were driven by geographical rotation.

Many members said giving the 2010 games to Vancouver bolsters Europe's chances for 2012 because of a reluctance to give back-to-back Olympics to North America.

Geopolitics only comes into play when bids are equal in quality, said Rogge.

He added that the controversial visits to bidding cities by IOC members would not be reintroduced after they were stopped following the Salt Lake City corruption investigation.