Thread by @MaasdorpJR

For those that don't know, I was meant to be covering the Olympics at #Tokyo2020 for @abcnews. Several months ago, I gave up my spot on the plane. I have no regrets. (a thread)

From the get go I want to wish @TraceyLeeHolmes and @davymark1 the very best, they're top-of-the-class sports journalists who will procure excellent stories from Japan for the ABC. I would have learned so much working alongside them.

My old team @abcsport are tireless, excellent people who do so much with very little. They are driven to writing stories that are interesting, engaging and entertaining.

Were you a fan of the corona blog? They had a huge hand in it too, giving it that first injection of sass.

Give @DanColasimone @Dean_Bilton @JonHealy @simon_smale @Sporting_Tragic and @tanishastanton_ a follow, pretty please.

But John Coates' despicable mansplaining to A.Palaszczuk has brought home part of the reason why I voluntarily stood down from the role of digital Olympics reporter.

https://twitter.com/mjrowland68/status/1417962353795026944

Sport is important. I still follow my Premier League team's misfortunes down to the minutiae of finances and transfer rumours, and the Springboks (boo, hiss) remain the only team I follow that seems to win anything.

But since last year, *covering* sport has felt acutely unimportant to me. Because of the pandemic I was moved from the ABC's sport desk to the news desk and the job that gave me the most pride in my work was giving people the info they needed to know in a new world of lockdowns.

I became involved with the ABC's coronavirus live blog, and having that direct connection with the audience opened my eyes to how everyone is battling with their own struggles magnified by the pandemic.

I loved the idea I was helping some people and even cheering a few up in the process (apologies to the two dudes who I seemed to trigger just by turning up).

When the Olympics was postponed, my content planning shifts were put on the back burner. I blogged more and more, became a sub editor, became a front page editor. Life had taken me away from sport reporting, a job I had fought tooth and nail to get into in the first place.

As 2020 came to a close, I honestly thought the Olympics would be cancelled. I had come to terms with the idea I would not be going (I got picked for the job in Dec 2019), with vaccines seemingly miles away, travel looking impossible as well as the spectre of quarantine.

Australia's vaccine rollout saw my partner listed in group 1B (she and a lot of her family are immunocompromised), while I was 2B.

I want to stress, the only thing I thought about with the rollout's rocky start was how long it would take my partner to get vaccinated, not me. I'm one of those annoying never-gets-sick types, so I was fine being at the back of the queue.

The new year rolls 'round, and I'm having sleepless nights. I can't go to Tokyo. I can't put my partner, her family, my two-year-old at risk. There were enough stories of people testing positive after quarantine to think it was an unacceptable risk

And a risk for what? For me to cover a sporting festival that should not be taking place. The people of Japan don't want it, any doctor will tell you it's an obscene risk, and the driving force is big business insisting it goes ahead.

I couldn't put my family's health at risk (or mine, as cocky as I am about my invincibility). I was giving up a career opportunity that probably won't come around again, but on health alone, it was the right call for me.

But hearing John Coates say those tone-deaf, sport bubble profundities to Palaszczuk brought out the other things I feel about sport business, caught so far up it's own arse, forgetting what is really important right now.

What's important is helping people. If that means helping your own family, or those around you, or those that want a distraction from it all and want to heal by reading about Australia's Olympians, do that thing. I chose what my thing is, and that meant forfeiting a dream posting

For a premier who has spent political capital to go to Tokyo for BNE's crowning as Olympic host, she can help people by getting back home asap (as she intended to, quarantine and all). Now is not the time for kowtowing to dignitaries and witnessing a ceremony in an empty stadium.

What a shame Coates doesn't realise that, locked in the big sport business bubble as he is.

If you're watching the Olympics, enjoy them. It's a source of good news which is in short supply these days.

Just keep in mind the things that really matter to you.

Quick one to say I did not expect (but am grateful for!) the reaction this got. Thanks everyone for the kind words. Thanks also to management at the ABC, who have been nothing but understanding and supportive of me. Stay safe.