IT MAY be difficult to see how Pat Hickey can lose his position as president of the Olympic Council of Ireland this evening when he faces a challenge for the job from David Balbirnie at the organisation's a.g.m. in Jury's Hotel. At the same time however, in the build up to the meeting it has become equally difficult to see how the 51 year old Dubliner can emerge with a really satisfactory victory either.

Only a display of the sort of support Hickey said he enjoyed a few weeks ago, when he asserted that he had been asked to run for a third four year term of office by 22 of the OCI's affiliated sports bodies and most of its 10 strong executive, would truly vindicate his claim that his opponent's complaints are groundless and of no relevance to the council's members.

Even assuming that he does retain his position as president the potential loss of some of his current allies in tonight's other elections would certainly weaken him over the next four years' and would allow those who would like to see him beaten the opportunity to claim some sort of victory.

Up to last night Hickey and his supporters were still claiming that he would enjoy "a substantial margin" over his rival when the 36 votes are counted this evening. But Balbirnie's insistence that the poll would be tighter than expected was supported by several of those in neutral positions.

While Balbirnie has been reluctant to talk up his own chances of victory, he remains hopeful that the election will be decided by only a handful of votes. With seven of the executive firmly in Hickey's camp, Balbirnie's primary aim appears to be to take a majority of the sports federations' votes and to achieve a shift in the balance of power within the new committee.

Both sides agree that the campaign has, to date, been dirty, with accusations of abuse of position, egotism and underhanded dealings flying back and forth. The main points of contention boil down to Balbirnie's claim that Hickey's management style is autocratic and exclusive, and the counter accusation that a terribly inexperienced challenger is simply fronting a return to the days of BLE domination at the council.

Whatever the virtues of the claims, Hickey's position is formidable. The former head of the Irish Judo Union has presided over an unprecedented period of growth at the council, with revenues from Government and the commercial sectors soaring to £1.2 million and £420,900 respectively, and the organisation's importance in the overall sporting landscape has greatly increased.

It is, however, partly the OCI's growing stature that has led to the current unease, and its increasing role in the awarding of grants directly to individual athletes rather than to its affiliated federations has alarmed bodies who wish to retain some control over competitors and ensure, for instance, that they take part in national championships and make themselves available for representative competition.

There is also some concern about the way in which the organisation is run. Balbirnie has made much of the fact that there is only one gathering of the 27 constituent associations each year, but Hickey is adamant that he has no objection to any changes in the way the body is currently organised.

"As far as I'm concerned change is a great man, and if the delegates decide that we should meet three or six times a year then that is fine. But at the moment we meet with each of the federations three or four times a year to discuss their needs, and that involves an enormous amount of time," says Hickey.

This method of dealing with individual bodies, though, combined with the policy of not publishing how much each sport receives in grants from the council, tends to play into the hands of any incumbent, and Hickey, a Fianna Fail man who display's several of that party leadership's most traditional traits, has proven himself a master at playing federations off against each other.

Balbirnie, meanwhile, has, despite an impressive record within hockey, much less experience dealing with other sports or in dealing with the Olympics itself, and this relative inexperience has been seized upon by Hickey who chortles about his surprise at being told how the OCI might be better run "by a man who has never even been to a Games".

The challenger's administrative abilities have, however, won widespread recognition, and Hickey himself described the man from Dun Laoghaire as "highly intelligent" and "a tremendous organiser" when he was originally named as chef de mission for Atlanta in the spring.

Balbirnie maintains that things will be "a lot closer than people are making out" and that "there will definitely be federations who nominated Pat Hickey who don't vote for him," but that, if anything simply reinforces the impression that, in this election, the man seeking his third term is the only candidate that really matters.

As a challenger Balbirnie is credible, but it is Hickey on whom the voters will pass judgement. But before the vote arrives, he may have some explaining to do about the manner in which he has handled his duties in recent months, especially at the Olympics: there are grave doubts about the way in which the ASICS versus Reebok sponsorship dispute was handled and, in particular, about the way Sonia O'Sullivan was dragged into that disagreement.

If Hickey survives the vote largely because the outgoing Executive, himself included, have a vote each, then he will be severely damaged.

That is certainly the sort of scenario that BLE and others hoping for change would like to see. Nick Davis, who had his nomination for the executive excluded on a technicality, predicted this week that "Hickey might not lose out, but we could still have a very significant shift in the balance of things on Friday night."

Louis Kilcoyne might prove to be the most vulnerable of Hickey's allies in his contest to retain his position of first vice president against Brendan Foreman, but several other challengers are also optimistic about their chances.

Even in the most disastrous scenario, Hickey's long term influence is ensured, for he is safely installed as Ireland's representative on the International Olympic Committee. But assuming he comes through this evening with his leadership in tact, he will have to rebuild some bridges if the OCI is to undo the damage that has been done to its image in recent times.

The impending launch of the Sports Council will provide a significant rival for its political influence on issues of funding, while potential sponsors will not be keen to have their name dragged through the mud the way that Reebok's was.