Team of 80 to travel to Russia
Funding from ISC, Universities and Sports
Comparison to the wealth of US College Sport
World University GamesA total of 50 athletes and 30 support staff and coaches will represent Ireland at the World University Games in Kazan, Russia from July 7th to 17th.
The team will take part in seven sports – Athletics, Air Rifle, Gymnastics, Men’s Football, Rowing, Swimming and Women’s Football.
They will be part of a gathering of 13,000 student athletes from around the world in an event that is second only to the Olympic Games in terms of size and participation numbers.  The Games take place every two years, in the year before and after an Olympics.
In 2015, the gap in the calendar will be filled by the first European Olympics, hosted in Baku under the leadership of Irish IOC Executive member, Pat Hickey.
Irish athletes who have gone on from the World University Games to stardom in their own sport include athletes Sonia O’Sullivan, Derval O’Rourke and Paul Hession as well as golfer Graeme McDowell and swimmer Gary O’Toole.
The cost of preparing and sending the team to Russia will be met by the Irish Sports Council, the respective national governing bodies and by the universities and third level institutions they attend.
“Third level institutions play a hugely important role in Irish sport and are often a crucial step in the life of developing athletes,” said Minister Ring at the team announcement.
“They provide degree courses in sports related subjects and also provide some outstanding sports facilities that are increasingly attracting the best of our young Irish athletes.
“The Irish Sports Council is delighted to support Irish participation at the World University Games,” added irish Sports Council CEO John Treacy.  “It is a major international event and Ireland has a proud record of achievement at the Games. The Council has high hopes of another outstanding effort by the Irish team.”
Student Sport Ireland used to be known as CUSAI and consists of 30 third level institutions on the island of Ireland representing 160,000 athletes.
It runs intercollegiate competition, representation at international events like this and mass participation events aimed at lengthening students involvement in sport.
There is little or no commercial investment in college sport here, in stark contrast to the US.  There it is very big business with Notre Dame earning over €1 million a game for TV coverage of its regular season matches.  ESPN pays over 25 times that sum to televise five of the more than 30 key Championship matches that are the high point of the season in January.
Basketball and football coaches are on multi million salaries and college endowments are generated with as much enthusiasm around sport as academic reputation in all but the are exceptional case.
The UCD Smurfit Business School retained the World Championship for Graduate schools in April this year but the colleges they were competing against would certainly not give second best in terms of financing.
Perhaps given the importance of attracting graduate talent, the world of college sport in Ireland may be worth investigating a little closer.
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