The XXX Olympiad is coming to London, which is great news for the country, particularly for sport and tourism. Congratulations to the whole bid team – obviously a job very well done, not least for overcoming the odds which were stacked in Paris’s favour.

The details (as if any more are really needed) from Channel 4:

London was won the bid to host the 2012 Olympic bid. The favourite, Paris, came second with Madrid, New York and Moscow trailing behind.

There were scenes of jubilation in Trafalgar Square when the result announced. Kelly Holmes was in tears after the news broke.

“It is just amazing,” the double Olympic champion said. “It was so nerve-racking, I just cannot believe it.”

Olympic athletes threw their arms in the air in delight and hugged each other in London’s Trafalgar Square as they watched the announcement in Singapore on a huge screen. Champagne was sprayed around under Nelson’s Column and thousands danced in the streets after the announcement was made.

In addition to Kelly’s tears, apparently Kay Burley, that most professional and sober of journalists, was ‘shrieking’ over on Sky News. I’m glad I was watching the announcement on the BBC. Though, on an occasion so unexpectedly happy as this, I think I can even let The Burley’s unprofessionalism go.

No doubt I’ll be posting more on this over the next, erm, seven years, as there are a number of questions unanswered as yet. Will the UK manage to make a good job of it? Well, the team have done pretty well so far, and I have every confidence that they will continue, and produce the best games seen anywhere.

But then, my posting record on the London 2012 bid leaves quite a bit to be desired. Remember this?

London’s Olympic dream in tatters
Did anyone ever think that we had a chance of seeing the Olympic Games in London? It was never terribly likely, and I’m not sure that the bid had a great deal of public support anyway, particularly from those who live further north than Coventry, since it just seemed like (yet again) vast amounts of money would be spent on an event in London, while the rest of the country would be pretty much left out… Of course, if all of this speculation is wrong and Mike Lee (London 2012’s director of communications) is right, then I could end up looking very silly

Erm… excuses… yes… a lot can change in six months… and, as I’ve said, I’m happy to have been proved wrong. What more can I possibly say in the face of being so cringe-worthily wrong? I suppose I could just point out that it might help me achieve this:

98. Go to the Olympics

Anyway, however much I doubted, I think it’s only fair to give the bid team their due: Congratulations again to the whole team, you did a phenomenal job.