AUGUST 4 - SEBASTIAN COE (pictured) claimed today that he is more excited about London 2012 than when he started despite the criticism they are facing.

 

In an interview published in Management Today magazine he said the fact critics are attacking London 2012 over funding and legacy has not lessened his resolve to deliver the best Games ever nor why he is so heavily involved.

 

He said: "If anything, my enjoyment has hardened.

 

"In my mind, the importance of this project is this big ..."

 

"These Games are a vehicle to address so much that is wrong; sport is a catalyst for social change.

 

"I'm delighted that the project can be used to clean up the capital's rivers and to leave a sustainable new community behind, of course I am, but this is about sport.

 

"It's still about sport.

 

"It was sport that I went to Singapore to canvass on our behalf for.

 

"I've never been bashful about that.

 

"I feel that way because we all have blood on our hands politically.

 

"We did immense damage in the 1960s to the development of sport for our children.

 

"There were the nostrums about mass participation in the 1970s and '80s, but we sold off the playing fields.

 

"Then we sat through the 1990s and did nothing.

 

"Now, we're worrying what to do to remedy the damage we've done.

 

"I feel more acutely now than ever that these Games can bring about serious change."

 

Management Today describes Coe as "like a white, sports-mad Barack Obama", a reference to the Democratic nomination to stand for President of the United States, in his enthusiasm for the fact that the Games will be success.

 

Coe said: "I was talking to the people from Barcelona [the 1992 host] about this only recently.

 

"It started off for them with everybody fantastically excited.

 

"Then that changed to worries about the cost.

 

"Yet they delivered a great Games and regeneration - which is continuing even now, long after 1992.

 

"In Sydney in 2000, on the morning of the opening ceremony, the Sydney Morning Herald was writing that Aussies should hang their heads in shame, they would never pull it off.

 

"And then, after the ceremony - which was spectacular - they were saying it was their idea and the best thing that had ever happened to Australia."

 

To read the full article visit http://www.managementtoday.co.uk/news/835650.