Sydney Olympic FC ordered to remove Olympic rings from new logo

Former National Soccer League club Sydney Olympic could be forced to scrap their three-day-old logo after infringing on official “Olympic properties”, including the Olympic rings and torch.

Olympic launched their new logo on Sunday, before their first home game in the new Australian Championship. It features the letter ‘S’ and a torch, with a small version of the Olympic rings – which featured on their badge for 20 years during the NSL days – located underneath.

However, the club has since updated their display picture on social media accounts to a version without the rings, as it emerged they did not approach the Australian Olympic Committee – the legal custodian of the Olympic brand within Australia – for permission to use them.

Though the club is allowed to use the name ‘Sydney Olympic’ because they were formed before the Olympic Insignia Protection Act was passed in 1987, the use of “Olympic properties” such as the rings and torch is not included without being granted a licence to do so.

“These are protected Olympic IP reserved exclusively for official Olympic sponsors and licensees,” an AOC spokesperson said in a statement.

“Sydney Olympic FC did not approach the AOC about this logo specifically, but we will give them a call and talk through Olympic IP permissions, requesting them to remove the rings and torch given they are protected Olympic properties.”

Sydney Olympic declined to comment.

The Olympic Rings are also printed underneath the back collar of the team’s jerseys.

It is unclear whether Sydney Olympic will be forced to make further changes to remove the torch, which is presently on the logo of another Greek-backed club, West Adelaide Hellas. However, the use of the torch in conjunction with the word ‘Olympic’ could be problematic.

The flame of the torch also takes the shape of the Sydney Opera House, which could pose a separate trademark issue. National Basketball League side Sydney Kings unveiled a rebrand in 2020 without the iconic landmark’s likeness after the NBL and the Opera House failed to come to a licensing agreement. The Kings were later allowed to use the Opera House’s outline, which had been part of their logo since they began in 1988.

Founded in 1957 as Pan-Hellenic, Sydney Olympic took on its current name when the club entered the NSL in 1977 – 16 years before Sydney was awarded the 2000 Olympic Games.

‘Olympic’ is a common name among many Greek-Australian soccer clubs, in reference to the town of Olympia, the cradle of the modern Olympic movement in Greece. For Greek migrants, the word carries immense symbolic weight.

The AOC and International Olympic Committee are known for aggressively policing their intellectual property, and acting swiftly when non-affiliated businesses or other organisations use Olympic symbols without permission.