The Winter Games are rarely a hotbed of political intrigue. But these are strange times – and athletes want to make their voices heardWhen Lindsey Vonn looked toward the Pyeongchang Winter Games, which kick off in 30 days’ time, the Olympic gold-medalist seized the opportunity to slam Donald Trump: “I hope to represent the people of the United States, not the president.” She added: “I want to represent our country well. I don’t think that there are a lot of people currently in our government that do that.”In a country where unquestioning deference to the office of the presidency is a presumed duty of citizenship, this was a remarkable statement. But was it a clarion call for athletes to become...
The Winter Olympics, World Cup and Commonwealth Games will all have an unavoidable backdrop that reminds us that all international sport is politicalIn the winter of 1945, Dynamo Moscow came to Britain on a goodwill football tour that turned out to be anything but. They played Chelsea, Cardiff City, Arsenal and Rangers, the last two matches so rancorous they inspired George Orwell to write his famous essay The Sporting Spirit. The tour, Orwell wrote, had only created fresh animosity on both sides. “And how could it be otherwise?” he asked. “I’m always amazed when I hear people saying that sport creates goodwill between nations.” Sport, Orwell thought, had become “bound up with the rise of nationalism – that is, with...
Lindsey Vonn’s outburst against Donald Trump means she takes her place in a complex game where politics and sport have once again become deeply entangledOn the face of it, Lindsey Vonn looks like Donald Trump’s type. Tall, blond, blue-eyed and a former star – naked but for a coat of paint – of Sports Illustrated’s annual swimsuit issue, the champion skier is the epitome of what would once have been called an all-American girl. And she will be one of the main draws of February’s Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang, hoping to repeat her 2010 Olympic downhill win in Vancouver and thus take a measure of solace for her absence through injury in Sochi four years ago.Coming off a 2016-17 season...