Olympic organisers have reacted to riots in London by pledging to introduce ‘events which the local community can identify with’ ahead of next year’s games in the city.

“Stealing tellies and setting shops on fire are apparently what the kids are into these days, so we need to try and reach out to them if the Olympics are to be a success,” said Sebastian I. Shouldcoco, CEO of the games. “And we thought Playstations were anti-social!”

“The logistics will be tough but we think that by harnessing the skills of our young people we can offer them the more constructive outlet of athletic competition - and it’ll be another couple of guaranteed medals in the bag too.”

Reaction from around the world has been mixed. Northern Ireland, France and America all welcomed the “innovative” move but countries with little recent rioting experience like Japan and Canada said the new events were “not in the Olympic spirit.”

Spokesmen for Libya, Syria and Egypt said the changes didn’t go far enough and that only the introduction of a ‘brutally murder your own citizens’ event would level the playing field.
Some social commentators in the UK have blamed savage cuts in youth services for the riots, saying that their Government could have avoided the situation by maintaining funding.

“It’s pretty obvious what will happen when you close the youth clubs,” said community worker Nieve.
“Where you see louts burning down Tesco, I see unhappy children making a statement about the loss of their after-school table tennis tournaments.”

“Before the cuts we were able to offer kids an outlet, provide them with materials to burn in a supervised environment and let them practice looting on the kitchen. But they always brought the cups back afterwards. Now we’ve lost that safety net, which is a shame.”

Eoin Ryan