Steering group to plot Olympic success, says report

A STEERING group should be established to co-ordinate preparations for the 2012 Olympics and prevent the damaging rows between sporting bodies that affected the Irish performances at previous Games, a report will state today.

The Joint Oireachtas Committee on Arts, Sport and Tourism began examining the issue following the disappointing Irish showing in the Athens Olympics. The report will label the Athens performance “a fiasco”, and make recommendations for change.

Chief among these will be that the Department of Arts, Sport and Tourism establish and chair a steering committee to co-ordinate and manage the 2012 Olympic “road map”.

“The joint committee feels that this is necessary to keep the various stakeholders working together with a common purpose,” the committee chair, Fianna Fáil TD Cecelia Keaveney, said yesterday.

There will be a number of other recommendations, dealing with issues such as the early identification of potential elite athletes and coaches’ and athletes’ funding. The report will support a “sport-for-all” policy encouraging children.

The next Olympics are in Beijing in 2008. But the report will focus on the opportunities presented by the Games in London in 2012.

“Goals have to be defined and progress measured over the long-term rather than aiming for a big bang every four years,” she said.

Despite assurances the team going to Athens was the best-prepared and funded in Irish history, results were hugely disappointing. Cian O’Connor won the only Irish gold but was later stripped of the honour.