Gloom surrounds Japan

Struggling star: Simone Biles of the United States performs on the vault. — AP

TOKYO: Days after lighting the Olympic flame in Tokyo, tennis superstar Naomi Osaka exited the scandal-hit Games she helped rescue, a setback that coincided with a record number of coronavirus cases in the host city yesterday.

Osaka’s departure left Japan without its best known global sporting figure in the Olympics, one whose multi-ethnic background contrasts with the image of an insular and male-dominated country that emerged in the run-up to the event.