ESPN is reporting that the Olympic committees of Europe have approved a new multi-sport event for 2015 called the “European Games”: effectively an Olympics where only European nations are invited to compete. They are expected to display similarly to events in other regions such as the Pan Am Games and the Asian Games.
Track & field and swimming, two sports that already have their own continental competitions to decide the best in Europe, have not yet committed to participate in the inaugural 2015 version of the event that has been assigned to Baku, Azerbaijan.
“These first games will be very much a trial and test run for a huge event in 2019,” EOC President Patrick Hickey told The Associated Press on Friday. “My idea is that this would become a qualifier for the Olympic Games in 2020 for certain sports. We have to negotiate with certain federations.”
The European Games are scheduled for June of 2015; keeping in mind that there is already a World Championship meet scheduled for Russia in July of 2015, plus a European Championship presumably sometime in May or June of that year. This means that even if swimming agreed to be a participant in the inaugural European Games, it’s unlikely that the event would get the best swimmers and/or their best efforts.
Even then, with other meets like the Mare Nostrum and Sette Colli also falling in June, this upstart event will have to fight the battle of some major prize money being given out elsewhere in Europe to garner the attention of the top swimmers.