Coe supports West Ham stadium bid

London Olympics chief Sebastian Coe yesterday backed West Ham’s bid to take over the 2012 summer games stadium, saying there was a “moral obligation” to preserve the venue as a multi-sports facility.

Premier League club West Ham has launched a joint bid with a local council in London to convert the stadium into a 60,000-seater arena suitable for football, athletics, concerts and community use.

They are battling a rival bid for the site from Tottenham, who are proposing to tear down the stadium and erect a brand new football-only venue on the site.

Sports officials, including world athletics chief Lamine Diack, have expressed outrage at the possibility of the Olympic stadium being demolished, saying Britain will have reneged on promises made during the bidding process in 2005.

Coe told BBC radio that Britain would lose credibility if the Tottenham bid for a football-only venue was successful.

“This is about our ability to be taken seriously again in the corridors of world sport,” Coe said.

“There is a bid that delivers against the vision that we took to Singapore and we have a moral obligation to make it work. It’s not beyond the wit of all of us to make this work and we have an obligation to make it work.

“The West Ham bid meets those commitments. I would have to vote West Ham.

“I find it inconceivable that grandparents will take children back to a Premiership football ground, stand among the tiers of sponsorship boxes and say actually somewhere among this lies dormant the memories of Jessica Ennis or Usain Bolt reaching the heights of sport.”

Coe said British officials had made a clear pledge to International Olympic Committee voters in 2005 that the games stadium would be used as a multi-sports venue for future generations.

“The bid was very clear and unambiguous. This was a community facility, multi-sport, track and field,” Coe said.

“... I genuinely don’t recall a whole heap about bulldozing down a publicly-funded facility, replacing it with a Premiership football club and inspiring a generation of Tottenham season ticket holders, however many there may be on a waiting list.”

Levy’s reaction

Spurs chairman Daniel Levy later hit back by accusing Coe of using emotive language.

Levy said Spurs’s proposal – which included a commitment to refurbish British athletics’ ageing Crystal Palace stadium to create a permanent year-round home for track and field – made more sense.

“There are all these emotive words being used. Let’s deal with fact rather than emotion,” Levy said. “This word ‘promise’ that has been used is such an emotive word.

“Surely it’s a far better legacy for London as a whole if you have a world-class stadium for multi-use within the Olympic Park that is full throughout the year and a dedicated athletics venue in south London.”

A decision on the rival bids is expected to be taken by the Olympic Park Legacy Company this week.