RICHARD MUIR

The year 2023 is looking like an increasingly important one for Glasgow.

The city’s Tourism Action Plan targets an extra million annual visitors by that year, with the aim of bringing thousands of jobs and other economic benefits.

Now Glasgow has been placed on a shortlist of two - our rival being Genoa – for the title of European Capital of Sport 2023.

Sport is deeply embedded into our city’s culture, and having previously won this accolade in 2003, this latest nomination is a testament to Glasgow’s growing success.

Undoubtedly sport adds huge value to the city’s economy, contributing £367m and employing around 10,000 people across the sector.

Glasgow earned its earlier sport capital title by demonstrating its commitment to supporting grassroots level sport as well as its ability to attract major sporting events – and that has grown many times over in the years since.

Our legacy includes the Commonwealth Games in 2014 which was hailed as the standout event in the history of the movement by Games Federation chief executive Mike Hooper, who praised “the way in which the people of Glasgow embraced the Games right from the get go was incredible”, with over 50,000 people applying to become one of 12,300 Games Time Volunteers.

Since then we’ve been the venue for a succession of ultra-successful events, including the World Gymnastics Championships in 2015, the GB versus Australia semi-final of the Davis Cup, the European Championships in 2018 and the 2019 European Indoor Athletics Championships.

And over the next year, Glasgow will host the 2019 Short Course Swimming Championships, the 2020 World Men’s Curling Championship and some matches of UEFA EURO 2020.

I recently attended the visit to the city of the delegation from ACES Europe, the association responsible for assessing candidates for the 2023 European Capital of Sport, and the reaction from the visitors was very encouraging.

Glasgow and Genoa will be judged against five key objectives and principles - physical exercise as enjoyment, take part to compete, group spirit and feeling, fairness and respect and improving health.

Gaining the title will give another boost to the city’s global profile as a sport city, as a venue for more great sporting occasions and as a visitor destination, with almost 30,000 people now employed in tourism and related industries.

Sport is big business and being named as Europe’s top sporting city will help reach that ambitious tourism target by 2023.

Richard Muir is deputy chief executive of Glasgow Chamber of Commerce.