Tokyo 2025, Beijing 2027 and… London 2029? The World Championships organized by World Athletics are the second flagship event of athletics after the Olympics. The British capital has all the right cards – financial, infrastructural, logistical – to host the event scheduled for three years from now. And at the moment, it is also the favorite city, given that the last two editions were held outside Europe and there are no other strong candidates on the horizon (there are also Rome, Munich, but they are more sidelined). So, is everything ready? The risk is to count without the host, that is, West Ham. Since the 2016/17 season, they have been playing their home games at the London Stadium, after signing a lease agreement with the city of London for £2.5 million a year for the next 99 years.
A sort of long-term residence, in short. Which West Ham has no intention of giving up, not even for two weeks. The London Stadium – located in the northeast of the capital, a gem with 62,500 seats inaugurated for the London 2012 Olympic Games – had already hosted the World Athletics Championships in 2017. But back then, there were no major issues: the event took place between August 4 and 13, and it was enough for West Ham to play their first three matches of that Premier League away – losing all of them, by the way. The problem is that in the meantime, also due to climatic issues – perhaps reconsiderable for a northern destination like England – the window for the World Championships has been moved to September. About a month later. When the football league is already in full swing and the Hammers do not want to take risks – a series of forced away games due to a similar unavailability of the Bernabéu this year, has also hindered the path of the much more renowned Real Madrid, costing Xabi Alonso his job: the competitiveness of the Premier certainly does not offer discounts.
At the same time, however, among the beneficiaries of the stadium is also UK Athletics, the national athletics federation. For this reason, they have embarked on what is expected to be a long tug-of-war with the football club, supported by the entire sector: “West Ham should show more heart, soul, and understanding,” said the organizers of the London Marathon in recent days, within the committee for London 2029. “We understand that it is complicated, that there are points and matches at stake and that every detail can make a difference. But this is also an Olympic stadium. A fantastic Olympic stadium: we hope to find an agreement that satisfies both parties, in the name of a broader perspective that also involves other sports like athletics.”
The ball is now in West Ham’s court, which can rightfully assert its contract and refuse the concession to World Athletics during the Premier League – or the Championship, if the Hammers were to be relegated: another element to consider. It is a time window of 14 days, not a huge amount but still to be addressed with an appropriate logistical alternative. Athletics believes in it, and in June they will speak more in-depth with West Ham’s management. And in the meantime, they throw a jab at them: “In those two weeks of the World Championships, Team GB will bring more medals to the London Stadium than all the trophies the Hammers have seen in their history.” Perhaps not the height of diplomacy, given the delicacy of the stakes.