Iwan Thomas has accused the selectors of Britain's athletics team of going back on their word after they left him out of the squad for the Olympic Games. European 400 metres champion Thomas, who had planned to race in Sweden last night to prove his fitness after a hamstring injury, knew he was gambling on his Olympic place by missing the AAA Olympic trials in Birmingham at the weekend.

But Thomas was highly critical of the selectors after hearing that fellow Welshman Jamie Baulch, who ran 45.06 seconds in Birmingham to record the fastest time in Europe this year, had got the nod ahead of him.

He told BBC Radio 5 Live: "If they had told me `we're going to make the decision on Monday morning - you'd best go to the AAAs', I would have been there and I would have given it everything in my heart to come in the top three.

"But they told me not to go to the AAAs. They said `make sure your leg's sorted. Don't jeopardise it and run next week'." He added: "I won't tell you the selector's name but the conversation went as follows: `I give you my word that we will not pick the third-placed runner until August 21st' " (the deadline for the team to be finalised).

UK Athletics performance director Max Jones denied making any promises to Thomas over his selection.

He said: "We would never, ever give a firm commitment. It would be: `well, perhaps, and see what happens'. There was never ever a rock solid commitment.

"We may have indicated: `take your time and prepare', but at the end of the day we had to pick between Jamie and Iwan and we could not leave Jamie out."

Greenpeace has accused Sydney of failing to live up to its promise to deliver a "Green Olympics".

In a critical review of the city's final preparations for the Games, the environmentalist group said Sydney had undone much of its good work through "a number of appalling failures".

"It's a bronze medal performance," Greenpeace Olympics spokeswoman Blair Palese said yesterday.

Palese said Sydney had set a new standard for future Olympic cities through their extensive use of solar and renewable energies and sewage and water recycling systems, but had fallen short in other areas.

She said Sydney had been given a rating of seven out of 10 when Greenpeace reviewed its preparations a year ago, but that assessment had now been downgraded to six out of 10.

Palese added that the most serious of these was the government's failure to clean up toxic waste near the main Olympic site at Homebush Bay, and the allowance of environmentally unfriendly air conditioners and refrigerators.

Michael Bland, environmental spokesman for Sydney's Olympic organisers, said the issue of cleaning up the toxic waste near Homebush Bay was a state government issue and should not reflect on the Games.

"The fact that Greenpeace, the harshest critic in town, has given us six out of 10 in its latest report suggests we are doing the majority of things right," Bland said.

Sydney won the right to host the 2000 Summer Olympics partly because of a promise to deliver a "Green Games".

Greg Norman has criticised the International Olympic Committee's (IOC) failure to include golf as an Olympic sport.

Norman (45), who will carry the Olympic flame in Sydney shortly before the opening of the Games, said: "If we look at the demographics of golf on a global basis it far exceeds a lot of the demographics of a lot of other Olympic sports . . .

"For tennis to be in there and not golf, I don't understand that. For basketball to be in there and not golf, I don't understand that. I am not decrying the other sports. I just think golf is not getting a fair shake of the stick." Norman said it is now time for the golfing world to correct what he sees as a mistake by the IOC.

"You have got to try and make this a unified front where everyone is involved - pros, amateurs, male, females. You have got to go right across the gamut."