The mayor of London invited Rupert Murdoch and his wife Wendi Deng to join him poolside for an Olympics swimming final Friday.
Boris Johnson, a conservative politician and vocal critic of Prime Minister David Cameron, requested the media mogul as a personal guest at what he describes as his "schmoozathon," along with other business leaders, the London Evening Standard reported Tuesday.
Johnson, who initially dismissed the phone-hacking scandal that poisoned the perception of News Corp.'s British tabloids as "codswallop," invited Murdoch to join him in part because of the business titan's investments in British sports, namely through his share of broadcaster BSkyB.