Major BBC pundit AXED as he reveals factor that ‘probably didn’t help matters’ ahead of major event
SIR STEVE REDGRAVE will be missing from the BBC’s coverage of the Olympics.
Redgrave, 62, will not be at this summers Paris Games, marking the first Olympics‘ he has missed in 40 years.
Redgrave has been at every Games since 1984, having won the first of five consecutive gold medals up to 2000 that year.
However, he has now lost his role as a pundit to Dame Katherine Grainger after starting work alongside Sir Matthew Pinsent, with the broadcaster deciding it did not need all three of them.
He told the Daily Mail: “I wasn’t told that I’ve been discontinued, but it’s sort of evolved.
“Matt is the presenter and Katherine Grainger is the equivalent to what I was doing.
“The three of us worked together at the World Championships the year after Rio, but then they went, ‘Male-female, covered on Olympic medals, why have three?’.
“Working for China at the last Games probably didn’t help matters.”
Redgrave was at the 2020 Games as the high-performance director of China’s national rowing team.
Meanwhile, he also lost the race to become British Rowing performance director to Louise Kingsley, having not even made the final round of interviews.
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On the decision he said: “I’m disappointed that I couldn’t give my skills to helping the team.
“I felt that I was in a position to be able to help with the experience of my career, and the experience of being out in China, taking them from nowhere on the Olympic medal table to sixth, well ahead of the British team.
“I felt that I was the right person at the right time to do that. Obviously, the powers at British Rowing didn’t think that was the case. But saying that, the team is in very good state going into Paris.”
At the postponed 2020 Tokyo Games Britain failed to win an Olympic gold in rowing for the first time since 1980.
However, under Kingsley there has been a resurgence with the team landing four golds in Olympic events at the World Championship‘s last year.
Redgrave said: “The team took their eye off the ball in Tokyo. There was a bit of complacency in the whole system and it sort of fell apart.
“They have a better structure now. It’ll be between the Netherlands and the Brits to be the top rowing nation in Paris.”
Redgrave walked off the BBC set at the Rio Games in 2016 when they did not show the whole of the Helen Glover-Heather Stanning women’s pair semi-final live.
A BBC statement at the time said: “There is absolutely no issue between the BBC and Sir Steve Redgrave and Steve will be part of our team for our concluding Olympics review programme on Sunday.
“We would never discuss future contracts of any of our talent.”
Redgrave had hoped he would be able to complete a full circuit of the Games by staying on until the 2028 games in Los Angeles, where it all began for him.
Elsewhere, Redgrave has slammed the decision to pay track-and-field stars who win gold medals.