Beach volleyball in Rio was a riotous joy but how will it play when a city is essentially forced against its will to host the global event?
You don’t get a great deal of down time as a jobbing hack at the Olympics but my schedule at the Rio Games meant the laptop lid was sometimes snapped shut by around 7pm. Ablutions at the team hotel were followed by a couple of beers in the company of any colleagues who might also have found themselves at a loose end. Thirst slaked, it was feeding time: a coronary of assorted succulent meats washed down by plonk at one of the myriad beachfront all-you-can-eat steakhouses.
Exhausted, stuffed, pleasantly sozzled and with the sanctuary of bed a short stroll from the Copacabana, deciding what to do next was invariably a no-brainer. The beach volleyball was on. Crucially, it was on nearby. And the laminated rectangles dangling around our necks meant we could get in. To repeat: a no-brainer.
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