Opening address at the 10th international Play the Game conference, 26 November 2017 in Eindhoven, the Netherlands

The International Olympic Committee stands firm behind Jose ‘Peping’ Cojuangco Jr., despite serious fraud allegations.

Another ‘Thrilla in Manila’ goes down on 21 September. This time, though, it is not a boxer taking severe punches. Instead, a president of a National Olympic Committee enters the ring. Will he survive?

Efforts to clean up international and regional sports governance six years into one of the worst crises in its history have yet to tackle the elephant in the room: the incestuous and inseparable relationship between sports and politics as indicated in Play the Game’s Autonomy Index.

UK sports organisations are expected to comply with the national sports governance code by end October to maintain public funding. But is this type of sanction beneficiary for a sport and how to ensure that the code does not end as a tick-box exercise, observers ask.

The crisis in sport arising from widespread loss of trust and credibility is far from unique - the phenomenon is common to almost all sectors. As the sports movement looks to address the issues, there may be lessons to learn from some recent initiatives in the business and charity spheres.

UNESCO’s sixth international governmental conference on physical education and sport, MINEPS VI, showed broad support for a new action plan aiming at strengthening sport and physical education.

Through three simple steps, including protecting whiste-blowers, governments would render to sport the helping hand it so obviously needs, Jens Sejer Andersen said in his keynote speech at UNESCO's International Conference of Ministers and Senior Officials Responsible for Physical Education and Sport.