Channel 7 sweats as Olympics plans still up in the air for 2021
The big question doing the rounds in the Channel 7 bunker as they nervously look ahead to 2021 is whether the continued spread of the coronavirus pandemic could sideline the Olympics once again?
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Could the Tokyo Olympics be left on the starting blocks again?
That’s the question doing the rounds in the Channel 7 bunker as it nervously looks at the new 2021 dates for the world’s largest sporting event.
The International Olympic Committee postponed the Games in March due to COVID-19.
Host broadcaster Seven backed the decision, which will save the debt-laden TV network about $70 million.
However, the doomsday scenario that the Olympics is a non-event in 2021 because of the continued spread of the pandemic is being tossed around at the water cooler.
As one network honcho told Page 13: “It’s a cobweb. It’s all up in the air.”
Strict quarantine laws may make it all too hard and the IOC and Tokyo Organising Committee are yet to strike a deal.
“They have pushed it back a year and a day, but, to be honest, we just don’t know if it will happen at all,” the Seven honcho said.
Contracts for all of Seven’s Olympic on-air talent and production crew have been terminated.
Said talent is now nervous about whether they will be picked up again if the Games do take place.
Word from inside Seven is the cricket broadcasting deal it signed after Channel 9 poached the tennis is hurting its hip pocket.
And the looming ICC T20 World Cup is causing more COVID-19 strife.
But the Olympics still holds a special place in the heart of Kerry Stokes.
The Seven boss tells the story that as a boy he stood with a crowd in Bourke St watching a television in Myer’s front window, hoping to catch a glimpse of the athletes at the 1956 Melbourne Olympic Games.
A Seven source says if the Games do go ahead they will be a pared-down affair, with lots of the commentary done from Australia rather than Tokyo itself.
This won’t go down well with Bruce “Mr Olympics” McAvaney, who wants commentators on the ground whatever the cost.
Originally published as Channel 7 sweats as Olympics plans still up in the air for 2021
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