Opinion | One step forward, two steps back
The decision to drop wrestling from the Olympics will backfire later this year, when it leapfrogs other sports and is reinstated
A decision made in faraway Lausanne, Switzerland, by 15 members of the International Olympic Committee's executive board earlier this month could well have a serious impact on Hong Kong. The board decided to drop wrestling from the 2020 Olympics but the outcry that followed means this ancient sport could have a second lease of life when the IOC decides later this year on the final programme for those Games. Seven other sports are vying to join the roster but they might as well wave the white flag now - wrestling looks a hammerlock to win readmission at the IOC Congress in Buenos Aires in September.
One of those other sports is squash, seen as a frontrunner to join the Olympic family before wrestling's unexpected expulsion. Squash is a mainstream sport in this town. It has been backed by the Sports Institute for years and our athletes have always done us proud at the Asian level.
Remember Rebecca Chiu Wing-yin defeating Nicol David to win the gold medal at the 2002 Busan Asian Games? Or even on the international stage, where in 2011 Annie Au Wing-chi was No 6 in the world, the highest ranking achieved by a local player. Every year, the city also puts on a grand show when the world's top men and women players turn up for the Hong Kong Open. Heather Deayton, a longtime Hong Kong Squash official who is now the vice-president of the World Squash Federation, was downbeat as she reassessed her sport's chances of joining the Olympics after the wrestling bombshell, saying it had sent "widespread shockwaves" throughout the community.
While all the focus has been on wrestling being "dropped", what many have overlooked is the sport hasn't been banished entirely. It has only been put on notice. Wrestling, which goes back 2,500 years - it was a core sport of the ancient Olympics - has a good chance of retaining its status in September.
By picking wrestling, the IOC executive board has immediately killed the chances of all the other sports which are fighting for the one berth available for 2020. The money had been on modern pentathlon getting the boot, but it survived because it has a powerful backer in the form of the Juan Antonio Samaranch Jnr. So against all expectations, wrestling was culled.
But will the IOC executive board be eating humble pie come September? Considering the backlash and widespread condemnation the decision to remove wrestling has received, it is doubtful the verdict will stand and the odds strongly favour wrestling being reinstated.