O'Callaghan defends management

ROWING: Ireland team manager Mick O'Callaghan yesterday defended the management structures at national level, in response to the criticism from members of the Irish team here.

He said he stood by his record and would not get involved in a battle of "negativity" with the athletes.

"It is up to the executive of the Irish Amateur Rowing Union to judge my performance and where we go next," O'Callaghan said.

He said he did not want to fan the flames of controversy. "My job is to get us in a position to win medals in Athens," the Corkman said.

Sam Lynch and the lightweight pair of Tony O'Connor and Gearóid Towey had been given the freedom to defend their titles in non-Olympic boats, although not with full funding, he said.

"We did not have that kind of money but we agreed to let them be coached by Thor Nilsen.

"All the other athletes were channelled towards Olympic-class boats, with the target of ending up in the top 11 (for men), or nine (for women), which if produced next season would gain them a place in Athens. All I can do is look at the results," said O'Callaghan, pointing out that the lightweight men's four had won the B final in Seville, placing them seventh in the world, and the lightweight men's double had come second in the C final, placing them 14th.

"This wasn't ideal but there had been injury and illness to contend with, and there isn't a federation in the world that achieves all its targets," said O'Callaghan.

The lightweight four had contended they were effectively self-coached and received no helpful input from national coach Hamish Burrell, but O'Callaghan strongly supported of the Scotsman.

"Hamish has been in charge of the crew for two to three months away in training camp. I can't see how he has no input. He made changes. His way of doing things has a different style to Thor Nilsen's."

As he made his way back from Seville with a boat trailer yesterday, O'Callaghan contended the manager's role had not been given due credit by the athletes.

"These boats are not driving themselves across Spain," he joked, pointing out the role included responsibility for accommodation and logistics. When he came to office in 1999 no boat had even qualified for the Olympics, but since then Ireland had won four world championship gold medals.

However, it wasn't about personalities, he said. "It doesn't really matter who is coaching or who is doing everything else," O'Callaghan said. "If I can get help from elsewhere and get results, that surely is what it is all about."

He acknowledged some mistakes had been made this year, pointedly picking out the case of Tony O'Connor, one of his most vocal critics, who rowed in Sunday's pairs final while ill.

"We didn't handle a lot of areas well this year. We shouldn't have put out an athlete who quite obviously wasn't capable of competing. The athlete himself made the decision, but if I had been aware of it, (his running a fever) he wouldn't have competed."

He said the key thing was to learn from the world championships, adding he would be giving a full report to the international rowing committee of the union.

The next big target was next year's Olympic qualifiers and ensuring Irish boats were fast enough.

"I haven't a closed mind on any area. People come up with criticism but we need a positive, it seems always to be a negative," O'Callaghan said.

"None of us is above reproach," he added, but said he was nonetheless reasonably happy with what had been achieved.