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Pound, also the former president of the World Anti-Doping
Agency, said the sport had women to thank for raising standards
and bringing squash into the Olympic debate.
Speaking at the opening ceremony of the Women's World Team
Championship in Canada, Pound said squash deserved its place on
the program and promised to work to get it there.
"As I look around the room at the many delegates who will
participate in these championships, I cannot help thinking, as a
member of the International Olympic Committee, that squash
should be in the Olympic Games," he said in his opening address.
"I will do my best to make that dream a reality.
"If that happens, it will be a direct result of the high level
of the women's game, not those of the men, which will make the
difference.
"So you have both opportunity and responsibility."
The IOC hopes to overhaul the Games to make them more attractive
to fans and sponsors, and is keen to make it easier for popular
sports to get onto the Olympic program.
Later this month, an IOC session in Monaco will vote on a list
of recommendations as part of President Thomas Bach's Agenda
2020, which could usher in the most significant changes to the
Olympics in decades.
Squash and a joint softball/baseball bid lost to wrestling for a
spot at the 2020 Games in Tokyo but the IOC is looking at
changing the seven-year rule for a sport's inclusion to tap into
potential new viewers and sponsors.
"The IOC will be meeting in Monaco next week and I am confident
that we will abolish the rule against an artificial limit of 28
sports -- and I cannot think of a better example of fitness,
skill, strategy and fair play than squash," said Pound.
(Reporting by Peter Rutherford; Editing by Greg Stutchbury)
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