Olympics closing ceremony LIVE! Paris Games end with star-studded show (2024)

French president Emmanuel Macron and IOC chief Thomas Bach both receive the applause of the crowd as we move to some delightful orchestral performances back inside a packed Stade de France.

They will kick off with the national anthem, La Marseillaise.

A lovely, softer rendition.

Roars from the watching crowd inside the Stade de France as a suited-and-booted Leon Marchand suddenly appears at the Olympic cauldron, picking up a lantern containing the flickering flame.

He’s got a long walk ahead to take that back to the stadium.

What a home Games for swimming superstar Marchand, who made history with no fewer than four gold medals.

We’re underway in tonight’s Olympics closing ceremony!

Thankfully we’ll have no repeat of the torrid rainy weather that blighted the opening ceremony.

It’s a stunning evening in Paris with the sun setting gloriously on the River Seine.

We’ll start with a couple of musical numbers out by the Paris Olympic cauldron.

Almost time to get underway at a sold-out Stade de France!

A great sense of anticipation for tonight’s glamorous closing ceremony.

It’s unsurprisingly the hottest ticket in town, with no shortage of superstars performing and famous dignitaries in the stands.

Paris authorities had to evacuate the Eiffel Tower just hours before the Olympics closing ceremony earlier today.

A shirtless man was seen scaling the iconic landmark on Sunday, leading to police having to escort away visitors.

Some who were briefly locked on the second floor were allowed to leave around 30 minutes later.

More than 30,000 police officers have been deployed around Paris and beyond to watch over the last Olympic events and Sunday's closing ceremony.

France's interior minister, Gerald Darmanin, said about 3,000 police officers will be mobilised around the Stade de France, and 20,000 police troops and other security personnel in Paris and the Saint-Denis area will be mobilised late into Sunday night to ensure safety on the last day of the Games.

British Olympic Association (BOA) chief executive Andy Anson insists that Team GB should not be disappointed with their lowest finish in the Olympic medal table since 2004.

Third behind France and the Netherlands in terms of European nations will surely be a frustration, with chef de mission Mark England previously insisting that the “wheels are going to have to come off” for Britain not to be in the top five.

"It's hard to feel like that when we've won 65 medals,” Anson said today.

"It's frustrating to be seventh in the medal table, but we've got to celebrate first the number of fantastic moments, the way athletes have won their medals.

"It's about this continual fine tuning figuring out what can be done better to move forward.

"The middle bit of the medal table below the United States and China feels incredibly competitive."

The USA ended top of the medal table once again today - and in the most dramatic of fashion.

Their women’s basketball team followed their male counterparts by beating hosts France 67-66 in a thrilling gold medal match, just holding on as Gabby Williams’ last-gasp buzzer-beater to tie the game was agonisingly ruled a two-pointer as she had her foot just on the three-point line.

That saw the USA tie China on golds at the last with 40, but they outdid them easily on total medals - 126 to 91.

The USA had 44 silvers and 42 bronzes, in comparison to China’s 27 and 24 respectively.

The USA also leapfrogged China on the final day at Tokyo 2020...

Those two final bronzes earlier on Sunday took Team GB’s tally for the Paris Games to 65, one more than they managed in Tokyo in 2021 but with eight fewer golds.

It is their second-best overseas haul to date, behind only Rio de Janeiro in 2016, when they claimed 67 with 27 golds.

It is the same number of medals won on home soil at London 2012, but with 15 fewer golds.

They ended up seventh in the final medal table in Paris, behind the USA, China, Japan, Australia, France and the Netherlands.

That is Britain’s lowest finish since they came 10th in back-to-back Games at Sydney 2000 and Athens 2004.

It was also their lowest collection of golds since winning nine in Greece two decades ago.

There was another bronze for Team GB in the weightlifting, with Emily Campbell placing third in the women’s +81kg category to add to the +87kg silver she won in Tokyo three years ago.

Campbell set a new combined personal best of 288kg over the snatch and clean-and-jerk events before celebrating with a cartwheel.

She is the first British weightlifter to win two Olympic medals for more than 50 years.

"The field was tough today and the level compared to Tokyo was so much higher, and I knew I had to bring out the big guns," she said.

"It's been a really tough road to these Games, and my family have been there every step of the way supporting me, and it's great that they get to celebrate out here.

“They are absolutely nuts and they are going to be on a high for the rest of the day.

"When I started weightlifting the plan was to make the Olympics in Paris and try to go for a medal.

“Tokyo was a bonus along the way, but today I have achieved the goal that I set out to do."

There were two final bronzes for Team GB on the final day of action in Paris earlier on.

Emma Finucane won her bronze medal showdown with the Netherlands’ Hetty van de Wouw in the women’s individual sprint over at the velodrome.

The cycling superstar had already won bronze (behind Van der Wouw) in the keirin and record-breaking gold alongside Katy Marchant and Sophie Capewell in the team sprint.

Finucane is the first British female athlete to secure a hat-trick of podium finishes at the same Games since the legendary Mary Rand won long jump, pentathlon and 4x100m relay medals at the 1964 Olympics in Tokyo.