Daire Whelan/Business of Sport The European Short Course Championships, the biggest international swimming event ever to be held in Ireland, take place next week at the National Aquatic Centre (NAC). It will be the first time that the NAC, the first development in Bertie Ahern's ambitious Campus Ireland plans at Abbotstown, will be showcasing its facilities.
Attracting top international teams, the championships will cost €600,000 to run. They are the last of 16 events which formed part of Fáilte Ireland's International Sports Tourism Initiative in 2003.
The championships offer a chance to raise the profile of swimming and the NAC in Ireland and abroad, but organisers have expressed their disappointment that RTÉ will not be covering the event.
Despite this, the 2003 championships will receive the biggest media coverage to date, with seven television and nine radio stations bringing coverage across the world.
The European Short Course Swimming Championships held in Spain in 2000 attracted a television audience in excess of 29 million, with over 50 broadcast hours. Coverage for this year's event will be provided in 20 countries with live transmission daily on Eurosport and TG4. Delayed highlights will be shown in the USA, Canada and Australia while Grandstand will be broadcasting the finals live on BBC.
Kieran Ruttledge, chief executive of Dublin Waterworld, the company that runs the NAC, says that the championships attract a huge following abroad, and that a relative lack of interest in Ireland is not helped by low media coverage.
Such an event could not have been brought to Ireland without the NAC being built, but Ruttledge says that lack of nearby accommodation has a negative effect.
Accommodation was part of the Campus Ireland plans but the 1200-strong team of swimmers, families, trainers and media will have to stay in Dublin's city centre and commute to Abbotstown each day.
While the rest of Campus Ireland may be "pie in the sky", the development of world-class facilities such as the NAC has shown that international events can be attracted to these shores and we can expect to see more high-profile swimming championships over the coming years.
According to Swim Ireland, there are 22 international meets held in Europe annually and they are currently in negotiations to host more, including the 2005 European Junior Diving Championships.
Leinster rugby's plans to redevelop Donnybrook into a 12,000 capacity ground are not expected to get the go-ahead for another 12 months.
This week the province unveiled proposals to build a new 2,400-seater stand and to increase the capacity of the terraces. The work - estimated at €60 million- is to be financed by building 101 apartments on three sites around the ground.
However, work on the ground is not now expected to begin for another 12 months at the earliest.
Mick Dawson, chief executive of Leinster Rugby, has admitted they expect some opposition to their plans but says that any redevelopment will only add value to the area.
Meanwhile, he is still hopeful that a crowd of between 12-15,000 will turn up to see Leinster's opening European Cup tie against Biarritz at Lansdowne Road today.
Only 5,500 tickets had been sold up to yesterday and interest in the game has been muted to say the least.
Leinster's move to Lansdowne Road for European Cup games this season has been, in part, due to the small seating capacity at Donnybrook.
Leinster's home ground has only 1,100 seats, of which the ERC get 360 with a further 600 going to season-ticket holders.
When their €60 million project is finished, seating capacity will be increased by 1,300 allowing for more premium seats to be sold.
However, Dawson warns that if their plan fails, Leinster will consider relocating to another part of Dublin.
dairesport@eircom.net
Despite the news this week that basketball club, Tolka Rovers, were forced to withdraw from the ESB Men's Superleague due to financial difficulties, league manager Karl Donnelly remains upbeat about the future of the sport in Ireland, pointing out that there are more underage participants in the game than rugby.
"Tolka Rovers's announcement was very surprising," admitted Donnelly, "and we intend to take dramatic measures over the next few months to make sure it doesn't happen again."
Donnelly doesn't see it as a huge crisis, but does attribute the rising costs of the game to Rovers's withdrawal. The last three to five years have seen a steep increase in outgoings for clubs - it costs an estimated 40-60,000 to run a team.
Contributing to these rising expenses has been the increase in gym hire and the wages of foreign players. Superleague clubs are forced to use schools and community halls and are forced to pay up to 500 per week for their hire.
The demand from other sectors, including indoor football, and the general shortage of halls has seen hall-hire expenses increase. Add in rising insurance costs for the hall-owners and clubs and the financial burdens become clear.
But Donnelly says some clubs in the Superleague are in sound financial health. "The majority are not financially buoyant but won't fold in the future as they know exactly what contracts they have signed and where their money is coming in from."
Team naming rights, such as DART Killester or Burger Limerick, have proved very successful for clubs in recent years, netting a minimum €15,000 per year from companies. GoFigure
Aus$26,000 - $75,000 The range of annual earnings of players at Setanta Ó hAilpín's new Aussie Rules club Carlton.
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adidas: E86.41 - compared to a 52-week low of E68.80. Jonny Wilkinson and David Beckham are ensuring that adidas's share price ends the year on a high.
