The dramatic increase in commercial sponsorship of the Olympic Games and its various constituent organisations continued in the United States recently, where General Motors concluded an eight-year deal with newly-established agency OPUS worth almost $1 billion. OPUS is a joint venture between the US Olympic Committee and the organising committee of the Salt Lake City Winter Olympics and the sponsorship deal involves enormous payment to both organisations as well as large advertising support for NBC TV's Olympic coverage.

Under the terms of the agreement GM has promised to place advertising to the value of $500 million with NBC for the five summer and winter games between the years 2000 and 2008 - this sort of commitment is bound to have a knock-on effect in future negotiations between the IOC and American TV stations over rights.

The company will also provide the USOC and SLOC with a total of around $400 million in cash and product, with the 2002 winter games receiving $30 million in cash as well as a huge fleet of free vehicles - despite being a major sponsor last year GM provided no cash whatsoever to the Atlanta Games.

The deal is set to establish a new trend for major American corporations with Coca-Cola, AT&T as well as Texaco, all expected to sign similar agreements over the coming months.

The support of the IAAF's Primo Nebiolo for Rome's 2004 Summer Games bid is one of the city's trump cards at next month's IOC convention to decide on the host city but one of the other candidate city's campaign is believed to have been dealt a severe blow by the endorsement of another major sports administrator.

So popular is FIFA president Joao Havelange within the Olympic movement that his support for Beijing's ill-fated bid for the 2000 Games is believed to have contributed significantly to the city's failure.

Now the great man has thrown his weight behind Buenos Aires' bid for 2004 and many IOC members apparently reckon the endorsement is the final nail in the bid's coffin.

Nebiolo, meanwhile, was angered this week when he discovered that there was a chronic shortage of volunteer helpers on the first day of the World Student Games which got under way this week in Sicily.

The Games, which are an opportunity for a country with hopes of staging the Olympics to win Brownie points with the IOC, have repeatedly been dogged by problems over the years and this year's event was no exception with work on venues far from complete when competitors started to arrive last week.

Then the organisers discovered that, having fed the names of 13,000 locals who had volunteered to work on the Games by Wednesday morning, only 359 remained on file that afternoon.

Of those whose names were still recorded some, seemingly ideal, candidates were turned away including Mohammed Mansur, a 29-year-old Palestinian born in Nazareth, had to apply five times and was rejected even though he is fluent in five languages.

"I applied to the regional office. Then I was told to make another application elsewhere and then another until I was refused," he said before adding "I can only imagine that I am 15 centimetres too short. I am a man and have not got the legs and blonde hair that appear to be regulation for a volunteer."

If things before the start of the Games had been bad, though, they immediately took a turn for the worst when the opening ceremony got under way. The director of the traditional extravaganza, Attilio Colonello, became irritated with a press liaison officer for the Games, who was leading a group of photographers around during the national anthem at the start of the ceremony. He is reported to have hit her twice, knocking her to the ground and wounding her so badly that she had to be taken to hospital. She is now suing him for assault while he says he will launch a claim against her for slander.

Understandably enough, Nebiolo is not amused.

Irish Olympic semi-finalist, Susan Smith, is just one of the many athletes from this country who have risen to prominence after starting their sporting careers at the Community Games.

In its 30th year, the Games now attract a huge entry from around the 32 counties, with many of tomorrow's stars among the thousands competing during two weekends of sporting endeavour at Mosney - the first of which gets underway this afternoon.

Cork footballer Steven O'Brien, former 5,000 metres world champion Eamonn Coghlan and Republic of Ireland international Niall Quinn (he actually won medals for chess) are among the many other well known names to have competed in the games since they were founded in 1967.

This picture of Smith, however, was taken in 1977 when the Irish 400 metres hurdles champion and record holder, then five years old, had clearly already discovered a taste for winning. Thanks to Martina Mulhall for digging up the photo.

One sign that normality is returning to Armenia after the recent civil war is that the country's football league, albeit a four-team version, has started up again in recent weeks.

The clubs have encountered one or two difficulties on their travels, however, most notably when Valona team Flamurtari were heading for Tirana on their team bus only to be stopped en route by a band of armed robbers who boarded the coach and demanded cash.

Midway through the heist the bandits realised who they were in the process of robbing and, having checked that this was in fact the Flamurtari team bus, apologised for the inconvenience, returned whatever they had taken and let them go on their way again.

The Ho Chi Minh Trail, the famous supply route cut through dense jungle by the North Vietnamese to supply their army and allies in the south during the war for independence with the United States, is soon to be used for an international car rally.

The event, which will cover the trail's entire 870 miles length, between Hanoi and Binh Phuoc province, has received official approval from the Vietnamese government and is scheduled for next January. Work is expected to start virtually straight away on reclaiming long stretches of the route which, since the end of the war, have become overgrown.

While the Irish team failed miserably to produce a single goal in Lansdowne Road on Wednesday, the match between Turkey and Wales threw up 10, although subsequent events put the disappointment of Irish supporters firmly into perspective.

The home team won the game 6-4, but afterwards one Turkish fan accidentally shot dead his 15-year-old son during some wild scenes of celebration.

A local news agency reported that Mustafa Portakal had killed his son Ilker when he fired a shotgun into the air on the roof of their home in the southern city of Adana after watching Wednesday's match on television.

Another youth was seriously injured in the same city by a stray bullet fired in joy at the victory, which kept alive Turkey's slim hopes of qualifying for the 1998 finals in France.

Firing guns into the air is a traditional form of celebration in Turkey and has become popular after soccer games in recent years.

Please send any correspondence to On The Sidelines, Sports Dept, The Irish Times, 11-15 D'Olier Street, Dublin 2 or e-mail emalone@irishtimes.ie