Wrestling grapples for its Olympic future

Wrestling, an Olympic sport since the first Games in ancient Greece, looks set to be dropped for the 2020 edition, after the International Olympic Committee voted on Tuesday to remove it from the programme.

The decision, taken by the 15 members of the IOC executive board, has yet to be ratified by all members of the body but looks likely to be ditched, as seven other disciplines vye for inclusion in seven years' time.

An IOC source told AFP that the outcome was "a real shock", after modern pentathlon was expected to be the one sport removed from the list of 25 core sports for the Games to be held in either Tokyo, Istanbul or Madrid. "Wrestling was not on the radar," the source said. "It was a very close vote between wrestling and modern pentathlon, maybe one or two votes separating them.

AFP