Way forward may not be easy

ROWING:  NOW FOR the postmortem. Well, not here; or at least not yet. Let's look to the future and what it may look like for the sport at international level.

The governing body of the sport in Ireland, the IARU, is looking for a performance director to oversee the international and talent-identification end of the sport to the 2012 Games and beyond.

The attitude of some of the athletes in Beijing has been lukewarm, at best, with Seán Casey looking back to the time of the last High Performance Director, Richard Parr, with little affection.

"We had a High Performance Director before and there wasn't much development. We had a head coach (Harald Jahrling) for the last four years and (international rowing) improved the most that I have ever seen.

"We can bring in more people or we can bring in people who are qualified to do the job right. That's what matters; that's what brings in athletes - and they are the people who can develop athletes.

"More office jobs? We've all seen that that doesn't work."

Parr was well-intentioned and cerebral, but his efforts to build a heavyweight programme in the previous Olympiad foundered, with some athletes just not taking his lead.

Jahrling was and is a good coach for heavyweights, but his dominant personality and his training methods alienated some athletes, especially among the lightweights.

The IARU may now be seeking a happy medium, but the way forward may not be easy.

First, the numbers of elite athletes is worryingly small - and dwindling. Eight years ago, Paul Griffin and Richard Archibald were the core of a rising group of lightweight oarsmen. Teamed up with Niall O'Toole and Eugene Coakley, their lightweight four finished sixth in Athens in 2004; and the crew, with some alterations, rose through the rankings to medal at World Championships in 2005 and 2006.

When the wheels came off in 2007, a new crew was assembled for this season, but the pool into which any coach could dip was shallow.

Now, after Beijing and a 10th-place finish, Griffin and Archibald are almost certainly gone; Gearóid Towey bowed out for good before the B Final; Cathal Moynihan says he will take a break.

"Obviously I'd like to come back for another Olympics," he says. "But it all depends on who's around. We need quality bodies. It's an awful lot of effort to put in if you're not going to get the return."

Eugene and Richard Coakley may still be in the picture. Some of the under-23s who drifted away under Jahrling may return. But where are the Griffin and Archibald of 2008?

At heavyweight, Casey, Jonno Devlin, Seán O'Neill and Cormac Folan have all been brought along (or in Devlin's case, brought in) by Jahrling. Alan Martin and James Wall are also in the picture. A good coach could build on Beijing, but, again, there is not a wide base of elite heavyweights.

Both Irish crews paid the price in Shunyi for poor starts. It's one area where all the training in the world cannot compare with competing.

And the split-up of the Irish system meant the two fours did not experience the white heat of competing against each other in camps.

One possible future is that present team manager Mike Heskin come in as performance director. The eminent coach Thor Nilsen, who headed up the Ireland system on and off for years, suggested as much to this reporter in Shunyi.

Whoever takes over will also have to do without the services of Neasa Folan, who has now left for the British system.