'Euro 2012' emerged as Britain's most searched term this year, beating 'Olympics tickets' and 'Whitney Houston' into second and third place respectively

We came so fragile and, let's be honest, fearful into the 30th Olympic Games that ended here last night with all the poignancy of the sweetest parting.

1. My beautiful boy

The Expert View: People say Sydney was the best, but in London we have beaten that

Outlook Oh dear. It seems America's financial cops have swooped on another British bank, although you won't see many Team GB tops at Standard Chartered's HQ if its repeated threats to hop it for sunnier, less regulated, climes are anything to go by.

The German rower Nadja Drygalla, who departed the Olympic Village on Friday amid allegations that her boyfriend, Michael Fischer, is a neo-Nazi, has said her partner is not a racist. At least not at the moment. "My boyfriend hasn't been a member of the NPD [National Democratic Party] since May," she told a German news agency. Fischer had stood in the local elections as a candidate for the anti-semitic NPD last year in Rostock. Olympic chiefs said Drygalla had done nothing wrong, and she left to avoid distracting the other rowers.

The critic without a ticket: It had nothing to do with the fact that the winner hailed from nowhere further than Great Yarmouth

Something, finally, to distract corporate London's ogling gents from the beach volleyball. Four topless Ukrainians from the feminist activist group Femen were arrested while staging an "Islamic marathon" outside City Hall yesterday. The women smeared blood on themselves and bore the slogan "No Sharia" across their breasts. They were calling for the International Olympic Committee to ban countries which implement Sharia law from competing at the Games. Officers covered the women and arrested them under Section 5 of the Public Order Act, which covers "harassment, alarm or distress".

Team GB's Fran Halsall has said that she can win gold medals in all of her individual events at London 2012.

If you thought the athletes were the only stars of the Olympics, think again. Their parents are in the running too

Record-breaking gold-medal wins are all well and good. But Bradley Wiggins hasn't had things all his own way. The poor man came out of the gym earlier this week to find his kit had been pinched. The Foxhills Hotel in Surrey, where Team GB's cyclists are camped, suggested that "cycling fever" was to blame, and that "an over-zealous fan has scored a fantastic London 2012 souvenir". You'll note the use of the word "scored" to convey "stolen", presumably because they don't want their hotel to be linked in the public mind with thieves. No such worries beset Wiggins, though, who tweeted: "Watch your kit at the Foxhills spa … there is a tea-leaf about." I think this summarises exactly what I like about him: a man who uses a spa and cockney rhyming slang in a single sentence. I call that a win.

Fran Halsall and James Goddard both negotiated the first steps towards fulfilling their Olympic dreams, while the women's 4x200 metres freestyle - minus Rebecca Adlington - qualified for tonight's final at the Aquatics Centre.

Businesses that are marketed effectively around the Games are seeing a "big boost", Culture Secretary Jeremy Hunt insisted today after claims the message to stay away from London during the Olympics had worked "too well", affecting some traders.

Michael Phelps, Ryan Lochte, Missy Franklin and Ian Thorpe are all well-recognised as talented swimmers. With a huge population, why can’t China have a talent such as Ye Shiwen?