By David Owen
July 12 – Last week Buenos Aires won the right to host the 2018 Youth Olympics with a little help from Lionel Messi, who was given a prominent place in a promotional video shown to International Olympic Committee (IOC) members before the decisive vote. Now Istanbul is attempting to harness the power of football to help its bid for the 2020 Summer Olympic and Paralympic Games.
The Turkish city – which is up against Madrid and Tokyo in a race that will culminate on September 7 at the IOC Session in…Buenos Aires – chose the day an Istanbul 2020 delegation arrived in Abidjan to reveal that two of Côte d’Ivoire’s most iconic stars, Didier Drogba and Emmanuel Eboué, were backing its bid.
The pair, who both spent several years in London, the last Summer Olympics host-city, at Chelsea and Arsenal respectively, now play for the Istanbul club Galatasaray.
Drogba, Côte d’Ivoire’s all-time top goal-scorer, said Istanbul would be “an ideal host for the 2020 Olympics – it just has that magic that athletes love”.
Eboué said that in his six years with Arsenal, beginning in 2005, the year in which London was awarded the Games, he had felt the UK capital’s enthusiasm towards London 2012 grow year-on-year. Istanbul, he said, “already feels like it has that buzz. There are always sporting events going on and you can’t underestimate the power an inspirational backdrop gives to sportsmen and women. It pushes you to achieve greater heights.”
All three bid-cities are in Abidjan for the general assembly of the Association of National Olympic Committees of Africa (ANOCA).