Ross ‘hopped on to success’ despite lack of team funding

SPORTS Minister Shane Ross was accused of jumping on the hockey bandwagon, praising the team’s heroics at the World Cup while the players struggle for funding.

The Government has been called on to provide more money to hockey following the national women’s team winning silver at the tournament.

In many matches, it was amateur players versus professionals as the Irish team repeatedly defied the odds to go all the way to the final.

Fianna Fáil spokesperson on sport Kevin O’Keeffe has also accused the Department of Sport of hindering the team through their lack of funding.

“The minister clearly didn’t recognise or remotely appreciate their sporting potential to provide them with any degree of funding in advance or during the tournament.

“It’s quite sickening then that he and his Cabinet colleagues have so shamelessly hopped on the team’s success as though they played a part.

“If anything, the department’s failure to provide funding to this team hindered their ability to get this far and become the first Irish sporting team to reach a World Cup final.

“Providing funding going forward and on the longer term must be examined,” Mr O’Keeffe said.

It comes as Sport Ireland denied the players had to pay a €550 tournament levy, but acknowledged that more needs to be invested into high performance sport.

CEO John Treacy was responding to reports this week which claimed the team had to pay a levy out of their own pockets.

He told RTÉ Radio One’s ‘This Week’ programme that the levy was stopped after the Rio Olympics in 2016.

Asked if players paid the levy, he said: “No. That is incorrect.”

He added: “There was a levy in place, put in place by the governing body up to Rio.

“Sport Ireland has moved to make sure the levy isn’t paid any more.”

Mr Treacy said Sport Ireland provided a token of €45,000 to the women’s hockey team, which is shared among a squad of40.

He also acknowledged that there was still “clearly a need for investment very quickly” in terms of high-performance sport.

“We would love to give them more, but we are limited in terms of our own budget.

“Our budget is about €10m a year in terms of high-performance sport,” he said.

He said New Zealand puts in four times as much investment as Ireland when it comes to high-performance sport.

“We need an investment very quickly in terms of high-performance sport.

“Tokyo is coming up, it is very expensive,” he said in reference to the next Olympic Games, which will take place in summer 2020.

A spokesman for Mr Ross’s Department of Transport, Tourism and Sport said its aim is to double funding to sport, including hockey, to €200m by 2027 and to increase participation and funding for women in sport programmes.