OLYMPIC chiefs start drawing up their shortlist of candidates to host the 2004 Olympics tomorrow in a decision which is likely to interest stockbrokers, builders and airline chiefs as much as sports fans especially in favourite cities such as Athens, Rome and Buenos Aires.
The 11 cities hoping to stage the Summer Games will present their bids to the International Olympic Committee (IOC) before officials' throw out the weakest on Friday and name the four, or probably five, candidates who will go forward to a vote in September.
Staging an Olympics can have a major effect on a country's economy. As well as the obvious stadiums and sporting facilities, often a whole new infrastructure has to be, built. Tens of thousands of people pass through a modernised city airport.
Sponsorships deals worth millions of dollars are there to be made. Stock and currency markets can move on the decision.
It looks as though the business community of Athens, Rome, Buenos Aires, Cape Town and Stockholm will stay in the running to cash in on the biggest sporting event in the world.
The other candidates - Istanbul, Lille, Rio de Janeiro, San Juan, Seville and St Petersburg - are likely to leave Lausanne feeling disappointed after spending a great deal of money on promoting their bids.
An IOC delegation, led by Germany's former fencing Olympic champion Thomas Bach, has visited all the bidding cities in the last six months and produced an evaluation report on their strengths and weaknesses.
The report will play a huge role in the decision of the selection college who have to choose a minimum four candidates but can add a fifth. But politics is just as important.
Rome, Athens and Stockholm are regarded as having the strongest technical bids as far as their facilities and organisation are concerned although the Greek city has airport access problems and Stockholm faces some local opposition.
After its rejection in favour of Atlanta for the 1996 Games, Athens has returned with a stronger bid, based less on "historical right" than the ability to provide a high quality event in Europe for the first time in 12 years.
Buenos Aires will probably be listed to satisfy South American interests with Cape Town doing the same for Africa.
Neither continent has previously hosted the Games but South Africa's crime problem is seen as a major disadvantage and Cape Town appears a long shot at this stage.
Istanbul officials seem to have resigned themselves to defeat - earlier this week they condemned the selection procedure as undemocratic.
Eagerly awaiting the outcome are the world's money men. In December the organisers of the 2000 Games in Sydney announced a list of 17 international and Australian firms who will provide sponsorship worth more than $500 million.
