Keely Hodgkinson pokes fun at West Ham over world championships stadium dispute

Keely Hodgkinson has playfully poked fun at West Ham after it emerged they could ruin London’s chances of hosting the 2029 World Athletics Championships.

Sebastian Coe, the World Athletics president, has made it clear he wants those world championships to be held in September as a finale to the athletics season. However, West Ham do not want to give up the London Stadium for approximately three weeks for the event as their season will have started.

Hodgkinson, who won the World Indoor Championship 800m on Sunday, made her feeling’s clear on Tuesday when she responded to a story on X saying “London’s bid for the 2029 World Athletics Championships is in jeopardy”.

“The GB team will bring back more medals to that stadium than West Ham have seen in their entire history,” she wrote, before adding hand over the mouth, laughing and heart emojis.

The 24-year-old received supportive comments from athletics fans, with one describing it as “the tweet equivalent of a two-footed challenge” and another writing: “Just when you thought you couldn’t love Keely any more she comes up with this banger of a tweet.” Some West Ham fans, on the other hand, suggested the tweet had been disrespectful.

West Ham secured tenancy of the taxpayer-funded stadium in 2013, a year after it hosted the London Olympics in what many regard as one of the bargains of the century. The club point outit has a “contractual right ensuring West Ham United games take priority during the football season”.

Asked about West Ham’s stadium deal, Lord Coe said: “I’ve sat on the board of one Premier League club [as a trustee of the Chelsea Foundation] and I’m very close to another one [Manchester United]. I think they would have been pretty satisfied with that deal.”

Rome, Munich, Nairobi as well as an Indian city are also interested in hosting the 2029 world championships. Final submissions from bidding cities are required by early August, with a decision made in September.

West Ham have won five major trophies, three FA Cups, the Cup Winners’ Cup and the Conference League. Hodgkinson has six gold medals at senior level in Olympic, world and European championships.

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