A British sports boss has suggested the Tokyo Olympics could go ahead without fans, due to the coronavirus outbreak.

British Cycling chief Stephen Park told the Daily Mail he was confident the event will go ahead.

Last week the Tokyo marathon featured just elite runners while the Sunwolves Super Rugby side have had to move home games to Australia. Overnight it was announced baseball's final qualifying event in Taiwan for the Olympics has been postponed from April to June.

The Olympics are set to take place from July 24 to August 9.

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"Right now, I'm really confident it will go ahead. You would struggle to find a day when the Olympics didn't take part for any reason," Park told the Daily Mail.

"So, will it mean that they might be different? Possibly. Look at the World Cup skiing in two weeks' time in Cortina, they are doing it on a closed circuit with no fans, and that's going to an area that doesn't currently have any infections.

"So might there be some of those things that happen? Possibly. Equally we are not worried about them. We are making sure that we don't let it become a distraction or overtake the preparation.

"As soon as you start doing that, start thinking it might not happen, what are you preparing for? Does that mean you start easing off, change the budget allocation? So we are full steam ahead expecting to be there in July in Tokyo."

Last week a senior member of the International Olympic Committee said that if it proves too dangerous to hold the Olympics, organisers are more likely to cancel it altogether than to postpone or move it.

Dick Pound, a former Canadian swimming champion who has been on the IOC since 1978, making him its longest-serving member, estimated there is a three-month window — perhaps a two-month one — to decide the fate of the Tokyo Olympics, meaning a decision could be put off until late May.

"In and around that time, I'd say folks are going to have to ask: 'Is this under sufficient control that we can be confident about going to Tokyo or not?'" he said in an exclusive interview with The Associated Press.

As the games draw near, he said, "a lot of things have to start happening. You've got to start ramping up your security, your food, the Olympic Village, the hotels. The media folks will be in there building their studios."

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If the IOC decides the games cannot go forward as scheduled in Tokyo, "you're probably looking at a cancellation," he said.

Pound encouraged athletes to keep training. About 11,000 are expected for the Olympics, which open July 24, and 4,400 are bound for the Paralympics, which open Aug. 25.

"As far as we all know, you're going to be in Tokyo," Pound said. "All indications are at this stage that it will be business as usual. So keep focused on your sport and be sure that the IOC is not going to send you into a pandemic situation."

The modern Olympics, which date to 1896, have been canceled only during wartime. The Olympics in 1940 were supposed to be in Tokyo but were called off because of Japan's war with China and World War II. The Rio Games in Brazil went on as scheduled in 2016 despite the outbreak of the Zika virus.

Pound repeated the IOC's stance — that it is relying on consultations with the World Health Organisation, a United Nations body, to make any move.

As for the possibility of postponement, he said: "You just don't postpone something on the size and scale of the Olympics. There's so many moving parts, so many countries and different seasons, and competitive seasons, and television seasons. You can't just say, `We'll do it in October.'"

Pound said moving to another city also seems unlikely "because there are few places in the world that could think of gearing up facilities in that short time to put something on."

- With AP