{"id":104230,"date":"2021-07-23T16:40:17","date_gmt":"2021-07-23T16:40:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=104230"},"modified":"2021-07-23T16:59:54","modified_gmt":"2021-07-23T16:59:54","slug":"tennis-star-osaka-lights-tokyo-olympics-cauldron-as-games-open","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=104230","title":{"rendered":"Tennis star Osaka lights Tokyo Olympics cauldron as Games open"},"content":{"rendered":"
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TOKYO: Japanese tennis star Naomi Osaka lit the Olympic cauldron as the Tokyo Games opened on Friday after a year’s delay due to the pandemic and with the threat of coronavirus hanging over the competition.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Osaka lifted the torch to the gleaming cauldron, which had unfurled at the top of a ramp representing Mount Fuji, in the highlight of a ceremony that was stripped back over virus fears.<\/p>\n

Japan’s Emperor Naruhito officially opened the Games in an eerily empty Olympic Stadium, after Covid-19 forced organisers to ban spectators at all but a handful of venues.<\/p>\n

“I declare open the Games of Tokyo,” said the monarch, wearing a white surgical mask, in the 68,000-capacity stadium.<\/p>\n

Osaka, whose identity had been kept secret ahead of the ceremony, was handed the torch by a group of children from the region around Fukushima which was devastated by a tsunami and a nuclear disaster in 2011.<\/p>\n

She tweeted that lighting the cauldron was “undoubtedly the greatest athletic achievement and honor I will ever have in my life”.<\/p>\n

The lighting of the futuristic cauldron was an uplifting moment in a low-key ceremony that unfolded in front of fewer than 1,000 VIPs and several thousand athletes.<\/p>\n

In another high point, nearly 2,000 synchronised drones formed a revolving globe over the stadium, to a cover version of John Lennon’s “Imagine”.<\/p>\n

A reduced parade of about 5,700 athletes, far lower than the usual numbers, filed into the stadium, not all of them socially distanced but all wearing masks.<\/p>\n

International Olympic Committee president Thomas Bach acknowledged the Games would be “very different from what all of us had imagined”.<\/p>\n

But “today is a moment of hope”, he said in an address.<\/p>\n

The 16-day event, with 339 gold medals across 33 sports, have a surreal air after the pandemic compelled organisers to make this the first Games with virtually no spectators.<\/p>\n

Athletes are tested daily but they are performing on the biggest stage knowing that a positive test could wreck their Olympic dreams.<\/p>\n

– New era starts –<\/h2>\n

Fears that the global gathering of 11,000 athletes could become a super-spreader event have made the Games deeply unpopular in Japan, where polls have shown opposition for months.<\/p>\n

But hundreds of people gathered outside the stadium cheered and applauded as the fireworks exploded overhead.<\/p>\n

Mako Fukuhara arrived six hours before the ceremony to grab a spot.<\/p>\n

“Until now it didn’t feel like the Olympics, but now we are by the stadium, it feels like the Olympics,” she told AFP.<\/p>\n

Japan has spent nearly $15 billion on the Games, including $2.6 billion in extra costs after they became the first to be postponed in modern Olympic history in March 2020.<\/p>\n

Tokyo is also battling a surge in virus cases, and is under emergency measures though they fall short of a strict lockdown.<\/p>\n

Organisers will hope public opinion turns when the full sporting programme starts on Saturday, with swimming, gymnastics, road cycling and tennis among the top attractions.<\/p>\n

Attention will focus on a new generation of Olympic stars who are looking to shine after a decade dominated by the likes of Usain Bolt and Michael Phelps.<\/p>\n

US swimmer Caeleb Dressel could target seven gold medals and 400 metre hurdlers Karsten Warholm of Norway and the USA’s Sydney McLaughlin are among those hoping to emerge as household names.<\/p>\n

In gymnastics, Simone Biles will attempt to crown her dazzling career by equalling Larisa Latynina’s record of nine Olympic gold medals.<\/p>\n

Surfing, skateboarding, sport climbing and karate are all making their Olympic debut, while New Zealand weightlifter Laurel Hubbard will become the Games’ first transgender athlete.<\/p>\n

The pandemic has not been the only hiccup, with scandals ranging from corruption during the bidding process to plagiarism allegations over the design of the Tokyo 2020 logo.<\/p>\n

The controversies kept coming right up to the eve of the Games, with the opening ceremony’s director sacked on Thursday for making a joke referencing the Holocaust in a video from 1998.<\/p>\n

Insiders estimate the IOC would have been on the hook for around $1.5 billion in lost broadcasting revenues if the Games had been cancelled.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

TOKYO: Japanese tennis star Naomi Osaka lit the Olympic cauldron as the Tokyo Games opened on Friday after a year’s delay due to the pandemic […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104230"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=104230"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104230\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":104232,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104230\/revisions\/104232"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=104230"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=104230"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=104230"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}