CAPE TOWN, attempting to bring the Olympics to Africa for the first time, will be at least the sentimental favourite when the race for the 2004 games begins this week.
But in a field left wide open by Beijing's decision not to run again, rival bids from Athens and Rome promise a classical Mediterranean tussle.
A total of II cities are expected to have bids before the International Olympic Committee by the midnight deadline tomorrow.
Three of them have already been hosts; Athens, Rome and Stockholm. Three more have made unsuccessful bids in the past; Rio de Janeiro, Buenos Aires and Istanbul.
The remaining five are; Cape Town, Russia's St Petersburg, San Juan of Puerto Rico, the French city of Lille and Spain's Seville.
Under rules first used for cities bidding for the 2002 winter games, the 11 candidates will be whittled down to four or five in early 1997 by an IOC electoral college.
The IOC's members will choose between them in September 1997.
South Africa have been courted assiduously by the IOC in recent years. The IOC president, Juan Antonio Samaranch, says the long Olympic boycott of South Africa was crucial in the battle against apartheid.
On a visit to Rome in November, however, Samaranch warned that the Cape Town team still needed to do a lot of work and instead praised his Italian hosts for presenting "one of the most important" bids for the 2004 games.
