SEPTEMBER 8 - SEBASTIAN COE, the chairman of London 2012, said that he was committed to the Olympic Stadium remaining an athletics venue after the Games despite new claims that it could pass into the hands of a Premiership football club.

 

The latest reports last week claimed that the £525 million Stadium could be knocked down after the Games and rebuilt for a top football club such as West Ham United or Tottenham Hotspur.

 

That would mean London failing to keep one of its main promises it made to the International Olympic Committee (IOC) when it bid successfully for the Games that the Stadium would be retain as a venue to host major athletics events when the Games finished.

 

London's initial bid in 2003 was badly handicapped by the Government failing to keep a promise made by then Prime Minister Tony Blair to build a new stadium at Pickett's Lock to stage the 2005 World Athletics Championships.

 

Britain had to give the event back to the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF), who subsequenly re-awarded it to Helsinki.

 

Another broken promise could lead to Britain becoming pariahs in the international sporting community and seriously undermine any ambitions that Coe holds to pursue the presidency of the IAAF or become a senior member of the IOC.

 

The former two-time Olympic 1500 metres champion, however, claimed that he was confident that the 80,000-capacity Stadium would become a 25,000-seat athletics venue in legacy with an anchor tennant like Coca-Cola League One club Leyton Orient or a Premiership rugby union club.

He said: "We made a commitment to the IOC to retain an athletics stadium after the Games and nothing that has happened changes that at all
 
"That is what we have agreed and we are working on a range of options as to who will use the Stadium after the Games."