Ultimately it lost, having made it to the third round of voting with Sydney, Australia, going on to win the right to host the 2000 Summer Olympics.

[7] Old Trafford Cricket Ground was to have held the baseball events, and a swimming and diving centre would have been built in Wigan following a successful bid.

AMEC plc would have been tasked with organising the construction of the stadium had it been built from designs by architects including Arup Group Limited and Norman Foster.

[4] The Manchester bid was fully supported by the Conservative government led by John Major, and it was seen as being a regenerative project for East Manchester with the Government providing additional funding for other local regeneration projects on top of that supplied for the Olympic bid.

[9] The IOC had published a report on 12 July 1993 regarding the technical aspects of the various bids for the 2000 Games; while Sydney was described as the favourite and Manchester too was praised, Beijing's application concerned the reviewers.

[12] This was after the IOC had stated that they would only consider bids from London, and not elsewhere in the UK,[12] but some members of the Committee maintained that Manchester could be a potential Olympic host city in the future.