Cash warning for 2012 Games

Lord Coe: Must not overspend at the 2012 Games

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• GB Olympic parade
• Tribute to Beijing stars

The credit crunch could have severe consequences on the 2012 Olympic Games, according to a leading sports finance expert.

With the Olympic heroes' parade through London drawing a line under the achievements in Beijing, attention has turned to the Games in the capital in four years' time.

However there are strong feelings that the organisers may now struggle to deliver the plans for the Games that they initially promised as the financial crisis across the globe deepens.

Mayor of London Boris Johnson has already admitted that meeting the budgets and deadlines would be a challenge - and those sentiments have been echoed by Tom Cannon, the professor of strategic development at the University of Liverpool.

Cannon believes that the private sector may now struggle to deliver on the promises of financial backing it made when London won the bid to host the Games in 2005.

"You can't say that it (the credit crunch) won't affect 2012," Professor Cannon said.

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"The plans came before the credit crunch and that is determining everything at the moment.

"It has not been easy so far for them (organisers) to win private sector support.

"Some of the people you would anticipate being involved with the financing of the Olympics would be banks and other financial institutions."

The Games budget is believed to be £9.3billion - and Cannon has insisted that Lord Sebastian Coe and his team must not overspend.

"They have to stick to the budget now," he said.

"Any element to which it might have been possible for the private sector to have taken up any slack has now been tightened.

"I will be surprised if the private sector delivers on what has been sought from them and that means that if the private sector delivers less support through sponsorship then almost inevitably the public sector will pay more unless there is restraint."