A potential Dubai bid for the 2024 Olympic Games has been given public support after pollster YouGov revealed Seventy-two per cent of those polled across the Middle East and North Africa would welcome a bid. 

Seventy-eight per cent of those polled said they think Dubai has the infrastructure necessary to host the Olympics.

UAE residents polled in the survey felt an Olympic Games in Dubai would have to be moved to a cooler time of the year. Dubai-based fitness expert Tom Woolf reportedly said making marathon runners or dressage horses compete in sizzling temperatures wouldn’t be safe, but added that a successful bid would “change the face of sport in the UAE”.

He added: “Funding for sport here would increase dramatically. Dubai 2024 would be an incredible incentive for an eight, 10 or 12-year-old to take up a sport and pitch for the podium place.”

It’s expected to be a busy two weeks in London during the Olympics, ed but drivers and commuters alike are already frustrated by some of the changes the city has made.

Two days before the start of the games, Olympic VIP lanes were reserved, causing congestion and frustration on London’s roads, according to the Associated Press.

The 48 kilometres of lanes will be operation from 6 a.m. to midnight throughout the Summer Games, and  unauthorized users are liable for a $200 fine. Londoners aren’t pleased with having to steer clear of the “elite” lane. Taxi drivers have staged protests at being kept out of the lanes in favour of Olympic athletes and officials.

Even government officials aren’t allowed to use the VIP lanes, which are reserved for athletes, officials, emergency services, and journalists. They’ll have to take the Tube like everyone else.

FC Barcelona and Chelsea FC have made the most of Google’s announcement that they will start accepting business pages again on their platform by being one of the first to join the Google+ platform along with Burberry and Pepsi.

It is considered a fantastic coup for the Spanish and English clubs who will take advantage of all the social media benefits of being one of the first ones to join. No doubt other major clubs like Real Madrid, Man City and Liverpool will follow suit in the near future but many will be sitting back and waiting to see how it can work for a club as some doubt the impact of the platform.

Barca announced the news on its website under the headline “Strategic agreement between FC Barcelona and Google+”. Chelsea have yet to make any such announcement despite going live at the same time.

FC Barcelona’s New Technologies Director, Dídac Lee, said: “It’s good news that FC Barcelona is present at the worldwide launch of Google+ Pages.” Lee added, “this strategic agreement with Google+ is further proof our commitment to Barça’s global audience.”

So far the page has gained over 4,000 followers and had over 900 +1′s.  Content wise the club announced their arrival with a welcome message to fans; “Welcome to the Official FC Barcelona Google + Page, stay up to date with Club and follow all the new developments”.  The only other content is 11 photo’s from the Atletico Bilbao game yesterday.  Chelsea have only 579 followers currently and added a few photos.

There has been some criticism about how well the platform will work and some comments have been less than flattering.  Users activity on the site has certainly dipped since the public launch but it still accounts for some 40m user accounts.

Other sports teams that have launched with Google+ include Boston Celtics, Phoenix Suns, Milwaukee Bucks, Phoenix Mercury, Dallas Cowboys, WWE and Portland Trailblazers.

The Qatar Football Association (QFA) has categorically denied fresh allegations from the Sunday Times newspaper, claiming that FIFA Executive Committee members received payments to vote for the country’s successful bid to host the 2022 World Cup.

Evidence was submitted by the Sunday Times to a parliamentary inquiry revealing that Issa Hayatou of Cameroon and Jacques Anouma of the Ivory Coast were allegedly paid US$1.5m each, to vote for Qatar.

A QFA statement was released yesterday evening, May 10, reading: “The Qatar Football Association is disappointed by the publication today on the UK Parliament’s Culture, Media and Sport Committee website of evidence provided to the Committee by The Sunday Times which contains serious and baseless allegations against us. We categorically deny these allegations. As The Sunday Times itself states, these accusations ‘were and remain unproven’. They will remain unproven, because they are false.

“The evidence from The Sunday Times states that it did not publish the allegations themselves since ‘none of the three people who made the allegations against us was ever likely to be willing to appear as a witness’. In fact, the newspaper could easily have published the allegations had they thought that it could be shown that it was responsible and in the public interest to do so.

“In the event, they plainly concluded that the accounts of these people were not a reliable basis to publish these allegations. Indeed, these accounts are evidently wholly unreliable.” In October, The Sunday Times published details of an undercover investigation that led to two of FIFA’s 24-man Executive Committee members – Amos Adamu of Nigeria and Reynald Tamarii of Tahiti – being suspended.

The inquiry also heard from the former head of England’s 2018 bid and ex-FA chief, Lord Triesman, who described the conduct of executive committee members Jack Warner, Nicolas Leoz, Ricardo Teixeira and Worawi Makudi in the World Cup tender as “improper and unethical”, claiming that all had sought bribes in order to obtain their backing in the December 2 vote.

Triesman claimed that CONCACAF president Warner had asked for money for sports facilities and for purchasing the TV rights to the 2010 World Cup for Haiti, which was hit by an earthquake in January 2010. He stated: “Jack Warner was very concerned that after all his years he had nothing to consider his legacy.

“He proposed some school or academy should be built and a set of offices that would be his legacy to Trinidad & Tobago. Dave (Richards, Premier League chairman) said ‘you must be joking, that must be about £2.5m,’ and Warner nodded. He said the money could be channelled through him and he would ensure that it was appropriately spent.”

As had been reported last week, Triesman confirmed that CONMEBOL head Leoz had asked for a knighthood, adding: “Mr Leoz said that he believed an appropriate way of recognising his role in football was not through money, but through an honour. He thought a knighthood would be appropriate, and I told him that was completely impossible.”

Triesman then recalled a bizarre conversation he had with Teixeira in Qatar, when the Brazilian football chief claimed that the nation’s president had no power in such matters, and simply asked Triesman to “tell him what I had for him.”

The fourth allegation detailed pertained to the Thai ExCo member Makudi who, according to Triesman, wanted England to play a game with Thailand, insisting that the money from the TV rights for that game should go directly to him. Triesman said that “he believed that was critical to making the arrangement a success.”

In Zurich, FIFA president Sepp Blatter said he would ask for evidence to support the claims and would forward any allegations to the FIFA ethics committee for investigation. “I cannot say they are all angels or they are all devils,” he said of the Executive Committee members. “We must have the evidence and then we will act immediately against all those (who) would be breach of the ethical code rules.”

According to Dutch News reports, Rotterdam will push ahead with their bid for the 2018 Youth Olympic Games following government finacial gurantees. 

Dutch NOC president Andre Bolhuis said: “We have the guarantees of the government. It (the decision) happened this week and we have sent the guarantees to the executive board of the IOC. I am happy about the situation. It’s very important to the Netherlands and Rotterdam.”

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) will elect the host city of the 2018 Youth Olympic Games in July.