BASKETBALL:Basketball Ireland are constantly striving for a voice, but it comes as no surprise when they are drowned out by the prime time sports that dominate the market, Gaelic games, rugby and soccer.
Last Monday night, on Questions and Answers, they got lost in the crowd again. Granted, time constraints dictate when television shows cut to advertisement breaks but the manner in which the query of Superleague manager Karl Donnelly was overlooked could be seen as another example of how basketball is being treated as a second-class sport.
Donnelly made a valid point. The debate was about Government grants for the GAA's intercounty players. Donnelly was picked from the crowd at the tail end of the discussion and he asked what knock-on effect the allocation of €3.5 million to the GAA would have on minority sports - would be money be coming from their funding?
Despite being asked to appear on the show, he received no answer.
It should be noted Donnelly is also a member of the GAA, and plays senior football for Na Fianna, the same club as GPA chief executive Dessie Farrell.
"I'm very much in favour of the grants for intercounty players. I think the more money that goes into sport in Ireland the better but the concern I raised the other night was that one of the conditions the GAA made was that it would not be coming out of their funding.
"So the concern is whether it is coming out of all the other sports' funding then?
"We have to wait and see how the Sports Council divvy out the funding but in the budget the Sports Council allocation has gone up by roughly €3.5 million, which just happens to be the amount he GAA/GPA players are allocated."
The budget allocated €57 million for Sports Council grants in 2008.
"No matter what way you dress it up, it's still going into the GAA as a sport so it is essentially making Gaelic games a more attractive sport for kids."
Basketball Ireland will not, however, take a similar line to camogie by requesting a similar award system for their players.
"If we were to obtain additional funding I don't think that would be a priority for our club teams. We would like to provide a full-time development officer to all our Superleague clubs. Grant aid to our international men's and women's teams would also be something on the horizon for us."
There are eight regional development officers across Irish basketball. Overall funding for Basketball Ireland is around €1 million.
Elsewhere, two Superleague clubs announced new head coaches this week after American Dan Mobbs was replaced by former Neptune captain Stephen McCarthy at the Cork club and Shane Horgan came in for Cormac O'Donoghue at St Paul's, Killarney.
Mobbs's departure was a result of Neptune's failure to make the Superleague Cup semi-finals, after defeat to Killester, while O'Donoghue cited personal reasons for ending a two-year stint with St Paul's.
The cup semi-finals take place on January 13th, with Killester versus the Hoops and UCD against the Tralee Tigers.
RTÉ will televise the final live on January 27th.
