Eyes bigger than your stomach. In Lille, where part of the basketball and handball events are to be held, the organizers of the Paris 2024 Olympic Games have finally canceled thousands of reserved nights, the organizing committee said on Monday, confirming information from The voice of the North.
“Seven months before the Games, we have released rooms in Lille which we estimate can be reserved by the start of the competitions, respecting the terms of the contract,” confirmed the organizers, without specifying the number of nights concerned. More than fifty handball and basketball matches are scheduled at the Stade Pierre-Mauroy during the Olympics.
“We are used to major cancellations in advance”
“It was not a good surprise,” regrets Boris Delecroix, president of the Lille-Métropole hotel club, which brings together 90 establishments. He estimates that these cancellations represented “around 2,000 nights per day over around ten days”.
“We are quite optimistic with this period of the Olympics which is going to be busy. We are used to hosting major sporting events in Lille, and we are experienced in this exercise. We remain confident. We are used to major cancellations in advance,” adds Boris Delecroix.
“We are quite close to Paris too, and some will perhaps prefer to stay in Lille, we remain in relatively accessible price ranges. But we are not going to hide, this is not excellent news,” he concludes.
The organizers also mentioned the “proximity” between Paris and Lille to justify this “release”. An Olympic village based at the Villeneuve-D’Ascq Stadium, with nearly 500 rooms, must be delivered between the end of March and May to be able to accommodate the athletes.