The Games Get Going
No dire consequences have yet stemmed from the ominous though temporary extinction of the Olympic flame at its bearer's first contact with English soil. French athletes have beefed about their rations, a British cyclist has sulked in his figurative but far from sound-proof tent, Dutch footballers have dabbled in something not very far removed from unarmed combat, an American girl diver has burst into tears and there has been an ephemeral scare about the touting of tickets by officials and competitors. But these ripples, whose importance has certainly not been underestimated by the popular Press, really only serve to emphasise how calm—so far—the Olympic surface has been. Public interest in the Games is a great deal keener and more general than it looked like being on the eve of their inauguration, when many hearts were, if not in the Highlands, at any rate as far North as Old Trafford. Already a working knowledge of the names and some dim apprehension of the personalities of the heroes and heroines are becoming diffused among us, and though there are no British athletes to put alongside Zatopek, Grut and Blankers-Koen there are several who can at least be mentioned in the same breath. As was expected, the large American team has already established a lead which is not likely to be seriously threatened by any other nation, and records are being broken with a far from monotonous regularity. Altogether it has been a good start, and Great Britain, resigned in advance (with perhaps almost too much fatalism?) to cutting an undistinguished figure as a com- petitor, can at least take pride in the part she is playing, under difficult conditions, as host.
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