The Olympic Council of Ireland (OCI) has been described by the director of the National Coaching & Training Centre (NCTC) as an inherently undemocratic structure which would have to be examined if Irish Olympic sport was to move forward.

Pat Duffy said he did not want to get into slagging matches with people from different organisations following recent remarks made by OCI president Pat Hickey when he accused the NCTC of excluding his organisation from Olympic preparations. But Duffy said the OCI had excluded representation of a large number of Irish athletes. "We had a team of 67 athletes in Sidney. We need to look carefully at how they were represented through the Olympic local structures," he said.

The OCI has an electorate of 43, consisting of a vote each for the 28 sports organisations represented and the 15 board members. "It is an electoral system, but it is not a democratic electoral system," Duffy said. Hickey's position as a board member of the NCTC will be considered when the board meets next Tuesday.

Michael McKeon, the acting director of coaching for the Athletic Association of Ireland who also attended yesterday's media briefing in Limerick, said there may be a court action against the OCI because his association is not represented on the council.