IT has been an Olympic build-up like no other. From the unprecedented 12-month postponement to the continual rumours about its cancellation and the ever-tightening restrictions, it is safe to say athletes and fans alike have been sailing in uncharted territory over the past year.
But finally, Tokyo 2020 – it probably should have been rebranded Tokyo 2021 but wasn’t – is here.
The Games will go ahead, but it will be an Olympics unlike anything we have seen before.
The most jarring aspect of Tokyo 2020 will be the lack of crowds.
Earlier in the year, it was revealed no overseas fans would be permitted to attend the Games, but it was this month the hammer blow came; with Japan being placed in a state of emergency, the organising committee ruled that no fans at all would be allowed to attend the venues in Tokyo.
This was a monumental development.
Remember the 80,000 fans packed into London’s Olympic Stadium to watch Super Saturday in 2012? Or the 63,000 at the Maracana Stadium in Rio five years ago to witness the host nation win gold in the men’s football tournament?
There will be nothing like that this time.
Other than the select few sports that will take place outside Tokyo, where limited spectators are permitted, the empty stands will ensure the action takes place in an eerie silence rather than the raucous, boisterous atmosphere that is the norm at an Olympic Games.
For the athletes, the experience will be very different too.
The Athletes’ Village, usually a mixing pot of competitors from countries and cultures around the world, sees the minnows of the sporting world rubbing shoulders with the superstars.
However, that kind of mingling is forbidden for fear of spreading the virus. After all, there can be few less terrifying prospects
than having trained for five years only to be told in the days before you are due to compete that you must self-isolate.
But, for all the differences at Tokyo 2020, there will be much that remains the same.
The sport promises to be electrifying, with many athletes believing that the extra year of preparation has allowed them to reach even higher levels than they would have achieved last summer.
There will be no Usain Bolt, with the king of sprinting, who has dominated the headlines for the past three Olympic Games, having retired in 2017.
But we will see the queen of world gymnastics, Simone Biles, set the world on fire as she attempts to add to her four golds from Rio.
Novak Djokovic, having won the first three tennis Grand Slams of the year, is on track for the golden slam, while GB athletes could well grab a
good few headlines themselves.
Dina Asher-Smith is looking to become the first British female Olympic champion in the sprints, Adam Peaty looks unbeatable in the 100m breaststroke and track cyclists and husband and wife duo, Laura and Jason Kenny, are aiming to become GB’s most-successful female and male Olympians.
Scottish athletes promise to make quite a splash too.
Fifty-three of the 377 athletes in Team GB are Scottish, with more than a few harbouring serious ambitions of returning home with silverware.
On the track, training partners Laura Muir and Jemma Reekie have been in exceptional form over the past year, with Muir a medal contender in the 1500m while Olympic debutant Reekie goes in the 800m.
Jake Wightman and Josh Kerr are both in the mix in the men’s 1500m while Zoe Clark and Nicole Yeargin are part of the 4x400m relay squad who are always fighting for silverware. Callum Hawkins is a contender in the marathon, which will take place in Sapporo.
In the pool, Duncan Scott is aiming to win individual silverware to add to his brace of relay medals from Rio, backstroker Kathleen Dawson could make her presence felt, while diver Grace Reid could make the podium.
Two-time defending champion Andy Murray returns to the Olympic stage, and will be joined in the tennis team by his brother and doubles specialist, Jamie Murray.
The women’s hockey team are defending the title won in 2016, with Sarah Robertson and Amy Costello both included in the squad, while on the shooting range, world No.1 Seonaid McIntosh has high hopes of winning a medal on her Olympic debut.
Rugby sevens could see the three Scottish men and two Scottish women make the podium, while the women’s football team, which has
Kim Little as joint-captain, could challenge for a top-three place.
It is, however, on the rowing lake and in the velodrome, in which British, and in turn, Scottish, athletes have traditionally been most successful and this summer is likely to be no different.
In particular, rower Polly Swann, along with her partner, two-time Olympic champion and now mother of three, Helen Glover, in the pair look in shape for a medal while track cyclists Katie Archibald, Neah Evans and Jack Carlin are all integral members of the British squad who rarely fail to excel on the Olympic stage.
So, for all the negativity that has, and continues to surround Tokyo 2020, the sport has the potential to overshadow it all.
Whatever the circumstances, the Olympics possess a magic that few other events can come close to.
And maybe, just maybe, when medals start racking up and the stories of the athletes’ journeys to get there are being told, it will start to feel like a more “normal” Olympics after all.
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