Have your say: Squash launches another bid to seal Olympic status

Squash’s leaders are campaigning to be included in the 2020 Games and say they had adapted the sport “to suit modern times”.

Several previous attempts have failed with the IOC citing difficulties with televising the sport, but World Squash Federation president N Ramachandran said those concerns had now been overcome.

“There were issues for the IOC,” he said. “You have to be a TV friendly, you have to change your product. We were an old model that needed to be renovated.

“Now we want to be an Olympic sport.”

If the bid is successful, it will come too late for the likes of Sheffield’s world No 1 Nick Matthew, who was crowned world champion for the second successive year on Sunday.

The women’s world No 1, Malaysia’s Nicol David, who won her sixth world title in Rotterdam, has given her backing to the campaign, saying she would “happily trade all my world titles for Olympic gold.”