[Pherekydes]

And the reply:

Olympic Club of Castlebar, Mullingar, Skibbereen..........not to mention Enniskillen and Ballymena.
Actually I have often thought the same. That there are too many "small clubs" on a small island. It does not need to apply to major sports but I see no problem with minority sports particuarly those which require little space....Table Tennis, Badminton, Wrestling for example.
In effect we already have places in Ireland which are "into" specific sports......Skibbereen for Rowing, Dublin/Befast/Cork for Hockey.
People move thru school into the next level of a sport.
As a fan of the Olympics, I am often amazed at just how many sports we play in Ireland.
Discounting GAA, Hurling, Camogie and "Winter Sports" , I keep records on 50 sports.
Possibly too many to guarantee any kind of Olympic success.
The OCI is obliged to treat every sport equally ......and rightly so........but imagine the consequences (rightly impossible in a democratic society) if all not Olympic sports with the exception of our national sports lost financial support.....so that (say) Snooker, Surfing, Squash, Orienteering were not supported or even "banned".
More so imagine the consequences if there was a national directive that only ten sports would be fully supported.
The Cubans did it with Boxing for example.........but not with Football.

Let me hasten to add I am not recommending Cuban style decision making. Merely stating that Olympic success could be "guaranteed" but only with difficult decisions being made.

[feargale]

Thanks Pherekydes.