Letter: Expendable sports in overcrowded Olympics

Sir: Can someone please explain why and when team games were introduced into the Olympics? I have always understood that the Games were essentially about individual prowess. But now we have such games as baseball, basketball, handball, hockey, volleyball and water polo.

I suggest that without them there might be some prospect of keeping within reasonable bounds the increasing magnitude, commercialism and national mania of the Games without offence to the spirit of the Olympiad.

Yours faithfully,

D. C. MASTERS

Tadworth, Surrey