Athletics: IAAF chief rules out Sheffield

The president of the International Association of Athletics Federations has ruled out Sheffield taking over from London as the venue for the 2005 World Championships.

The British government pulled the plug on the Pickett’s Lock site after the costs of building a new state-of-the-art stadia with suitable transport links began to spiral out of control.

Sheffield, host city for the 1991 World Student Games, was put forward as an alternative venue, but the IAAF now look set officially re-open the bidding process when they meet later today.

Lamine Diack said: ‘‘Sheffield cannot take the place of London. I will re-open the bidding at our meeting on Monday.’’

Germany, Italy, Spain, Hungary and Belgium are all expected to express an interest should, as expected, the process start all over again.

Britain would then have to decide whether to put Sheffield forward, chose another potential host city or pull out of the procedure altogether.