The Irish performance: Keith Duggan argues that since athletics success looks more elusive than ever for Irish competitors our medal hopes lie with minority sports
Another Olympics passes and with it - Cian O'Connor's glorious gold medal aside - a largely dispiriting Irish contribution. Many nations, from the insatiable United States of America to mighty Trinidad and Tobago will enjoy the afterglow of Olympic glory, but another winter of discontent beckons for Irish athletics. As Irish Olympians fell like flies over the past fortnight, the recriminations, rumours and promises have begun. There will be an Athens Review. Heads will shake. Funding is in place. No stone will be left unturned. Beijing, here we come. And we are bringing our own chopsticks.
For many people, the emerald tint to these Athens Games will be symbolised by Sonia O'Sullivan's lonely run around the Calvataro track on Monday night. As Ireland's medal aspirants were ticked off with grim economy on the daily Olympic schedule, we ended up - as ever - banking on the 34-year-old Cork woman to produce something heavenly. The gulf between her and the peers she would have eaten up in her halcyon days seemed a perfect representation of the chasm that has opened between Irish athletics and the international field. Sonia will not there in Beijing and without her, the landscape looks bleak.
"There is nobody coming through of that standard," said Patsy McGonagle after arriving home from Athens. "In Ireland, we have got used to there always being an exceptional sports person - a Sonia or John Treacy or a Coghlan, capable of the extraordinary.
"Maybe their achievements kind of masked the overall problems in Irish athletics. But the fact is now there is nobody at home close to following in those footsteps. And it is also a fact that the international competition in athletics has made the prospect of us winning medals nigh impossible."
McGonagle, who was in charge of the Irish training camp in Limassol, felt frustrated and depressed by the Irish experience, torn between admitting Irish athletes were getting singed on the track and field and the empathy that comes with knowing and working with them. James Nolan was singled out for criticism back home. McGonagle can swear on the Bible Nolan has worked with savage discipline for Athens. Yet he feels there was a slight naïvety to his approach. He was, after all, effectively coachless.
"I know James going back 10 years. He gave this everything. And yet the bottom line is he trailed in five seconds back on his personal best. That is disappointing." Personal best was to be the buzz term around Athens where Ireland was concerned. Maybe not medals, but a consistent trail of highest-ever achievements would mean we had located our North Star, our sure sign that we were travelling in the right way. Then came the reality.
Day after day, it was last in show. Jamie Costin had terribly bad luck. That eternal Olympian Nicky Sweeney became something akin to Zeus over these two weeks, omnipotent and frequently talked about but never actually seen. Gillian O'Sullivan's injury woes continued. It became truly grim when the rowers Sam Lynch and Gearóid Towey missed out on the final, where the intention was to win a medal.
It became depressing when Andy Lee lost a split decision in the boxing and then something of an Irish wake when Sonia bowed out on a sad and dignified note. Overall, it was the kind of tragedy that might have been written on a Grecian urn. Except you would be afraid the Irish would let the damn thing slip and smash it.
As RTÉ broadcast hours of other nations jumping, splashing, running and punching their way to medals, the national mood turned glum and then bitter. The Irish competing in Athens were a national disgrace.
But were they? As Pat Hickey, president of the OCI, has patiently pointed out, the Irish team arrived in Athens entertaining only a slim chance of one Olympic medal. Ireland finished seventh in shooting, sixth in the lightweight fours rowing, 13th in cycling. Éadaoin Ní Challaráin missed out on her kayaking final by one place. O'Sullivan made her final.
Even for those athletes blinded by the shine of the moment they had prepared for, it was impossible to question their integrity; it was clear their experience was a cutting-edge moment in their lives. On Thursday night, Mark Carroll trailed in fourth last in his 5,000-metre semi-final. The Cork man led for the first 2,000 metres, but at the final bell he was left behind. The easy conclusion was another Irish failure. But look: Carroll ran his soul out. He did all he could. Soaking and exhausted afterwards, he appraised the situation with sobering and touching honesty.
" I looked at it again and again - if this was Zurich, would I be top five? And I wouldn't be. In that field, I wouldn't be. There are a lot of 13-minute guys there. We watched the first race and knew we had to go fast. Sometimes you underestimate 13:20. It really isn't hanging around. But it is a time I should be able to run.
"People are asking why Irish athletes don't perform at the major championships. In my case, I can see several reasons. Number one, I am 32. I am the second-oldest guy out there so maybe it is time for me to ship out. The other thing is we were put into a position where we had to get qualifying times early. I ran 13:18 in Stanford in May feeling like it was a Sunday run. I felt in control and strong. I felt awful tonight. I said before, I don't see the point in getting athletes to peak twice. This is the Olympics Games. There should only be one peak and I think people need to realise that in order for a guy to attain a sub-13:20, in order to attain a sub 3:36 - it is peak. 3:36 is as fast as Eamonn Coghlan ever ran in his career. People need to remember this. We only have five Irish guys who ever ran under 13:20 so for me to run that, I really need to be pretty sharp. In May? And then we have to come back out here and do it again. And it is very difficult to hold it. In my case I couldn't hold it. I'm not looking for excuses but that is one thing that blows my mind: a pyramid is one peak; it is not two little pyramids."
Hickey is familiar with this line of reasoning but the OCI has statistics that show that those who make the grade late for the Olympics do not perform well.
"There is a perception out there that I am anti-track-and-field," he says. "But nothing could be further from the truth. Any athlete who qualifies for the A standard deserves to be at the Olympics because it is a tough, tough arena. We go by statistics but if there is a recommendation from the Athens review about the qualifying criteria, we are always adaptable. We are a track and field nation and the OCI will always support that. The reality is, however, that is becoming unreasonable to expect us to win medals at the moment. And since Seoul, I have been saying that we ought to consciously develop the minority Olympic sports."
Certainly, it seems to have worked for Britain, whose conspicuously successful Games have been characterised by wins in relatively obscure disciplines. Britain won just a single gold medal in Atlanta in 1996.
"Well, we have 22 (medals) now but I expect we will have another gold by the time we end this conversation," said the BOC press officer Philip Pope during the week. The team came with the ambition of nine gold medals and 25 overall. Their very first was in men's diving, hardly a sport to rival the Premiership. Lottery funding was the catalyst for change in the home countries, with an equal concentration on all sports.
"That has been the policy. And maybe we don't quite have the giants of track and field we had 10 or 20 years ago. We are hopeful of turning that around, though. But yeah, there has been an emphasis on developing sports with no major tradition. For instance, we had a softball team run very close to the qualifying standard. And if London wins the bid for 2012, we will be expected to have a softball team in the Games."
We in Ireland live on a small, damp island besotted by two indigenous sports. In that context, athletics survives against the odds and on those rare, magical years that it thrives, we should count our blessings. McGonagle is involved with the Donegal Gaelic football team and knows where many potential athletes are. "There are many guys out there playing for their counties because they are athletes rather than footballers. There is no doubt Gaelic games attract a lot of potential athletes."
That has always been the case. McGonagle, though believes there are other worries. Walking around Athens over the past few weeks, many Irish visitors were struck by how sophisticated and joyful the nightlife seemed. Young people stay out until dawn but there is practically no drunkenness or violence. With a start, Irish visitors realised the bar scene was light and fun as opposed to that sinister catch-all phrase "the craic". True, Athens has 30-degree summer nights. Ireland can't help its weather. But the constant drizzle and the hardcore drink culture and street fighting that goes on in Irish towns suddenly seemed truly shocking. This ties in with athletics in that it reflects a mindset. Maybe we have got meaner. And maybe we have got softer.
McGonagle believes that unless we invest in a structural programme at primary-school level, we are fooling ourselves with notions of the Tricolour fluttering under the five rings. He believes Ireland needs to bring in foreign coaching and needs a figurehead.
In Ireland, where interest in athletics and other fringe sports only provokes national debate with each Olympics, it is time to get real. The expectation that Ireland should win medals has become unreasonable if not downright foolish. That age has passed.
Hickey believes Irish fortunes will swing around again. Like Irish boxing coach Billy Walsh, he is confident of a strong Irish performance in the ring in Beijing. But he believes the profile of the Irish Olympic team is going to change dramatically over the next decade. "I fully believe that even by Beijing we will see more immigrants representing Ireland in Olympic events. By extension, I would predict that by 2012 the make of Irish teams will be completely different than was traditionally the case."
Tonight, Alistair Cragg will run the 5,000 metres final, a rare good-news story at the end of a draining fortnight. Cragg cut a compelling figure in his heat on Wednesday night, toughing it out at the front of a glittering field that included Hicham El Guerrouj and Kenenisa Bekele. The imposing running style caught your eye but more than that it was his expression. It was - in the best sense - cold. He was unreadable. The message was unmistakable: at 24 years of age,Cragg belonged in that company. Because of that, he did not look like an Irish athlete.
Which is, of course, the point. Cragg was raised in South Africa and in Texas. He emerged from cultures that regard sporting success with a cool and dispassionate eye. They expect. On the eve of another Olympic farewell, it is left to Cragg to make a last stand for Ireland. He may not know it yet, but his race tonight may come to be regarded as the bridge between Ireland's Olympic yesterdays and her tomorrows.
