Our ‘granny ru

We’ll be cheering on these athletes in green at the Rio games this summer – even if their Irish links are a bit f limsy!

ATHLETES representing a country they weren’t born in is something of a hot topic these days – especially in the run-up to the Olympic games, where flying the flag for your nation is one of the greatest honours you can achieve. However, sports people declaring for a country does not always mean they have particularly strong connections to that nation. Sometimes the affiliation can be, well, decidedly flimsy.

But at the risk of failing to qualify for the country of their birth, some contenders are willing to declare for elsewhere. Here in Ireland it can be frustrating for some home-grown talent to miss out on the chance to take part in some of the sporting world’s biggest competitions and watch as a ‘foreign-born’ athlete pulls on the green jersey.

This ‘country hopping’ can work against Irish competitors in other ways. Take, for instance, runner Fionnuala McCormack, who narrowly missed out on a medal in the 10,000m at the recent European Championships. The race was won by Turkey’s Yasemin Can, who was running for Kenya until last year, when she switched allegiances. McCormack vented her frustrations recently. ‘It’s more than frustrating at this stage, I am kind of sick of it really,’ she said. ‘I am not just saying this because I came fourth. It’s the same in every sport and I don’t think people should be able to hop countries just because they feel like it.

‘Once you’ve represented one country past a certain age, that should be your country for life.’

Like it or not, the so-called ‘granny rule’ doesn’t seem to be changing any time soon, which is possibly very good news for Irish Olympic medal hopes. After all, this is the first time ever we’ll be sending a female gymnast and the first time since 1948 that we’ve had an Irish diver qualify.

Here we profile some of the Olympians who will fly the flag for Ireland in Rio. Go n-éirí leo!