As athletes participating in 10 sports descend upon Glasgow for the Commonwealth Games, which begins on Thursday night with the opening ceremony, it’s been revealed just how close they came to not being there at all.
An article in Thursday’s edition of The Australian newspaper says it was Australia’s Commonwealth Games Association who paid for half the Games when the Scottish government refused to.
Craig Phillips, the head of Australia’s CGA, says the Games – and the entire concept of the Commonwealth Games, stretching back to when it was called the Empire Games in 1930 – would have collapsed if they didn’t.
Glasgow stepped in at the last minute to take over the running of this year’s Commonwealth Games. (Picture: Getty)
How did we get here?
