Sport for Business will be taking a break from Friday 22nd December through to Thursday 4th January.

We hope you have had a wonderful time over the holiday season and that we are all set to come back relaxed and refreshed for 2024 looking to do the things we do to the very highest standard.

It is always nice at this time of year to say a few thank yous.

Thank you to all the organisations that have had faith in what we set out to do some 12 years ago and who continue to support what we do. There are no grants, no subventions, no golden chest, just the income we make from your subscriptions and your tickets to attend the events we put on.

Special thanks to our Partners with whom we work most closely and whose support, guidance and inspiration allows us to do what we do and to continually push to do it better.

Thank you to all who have accepted my invitation to speak at our events, and all who attended, You contributed to the camaraderie and at times inspiration that they brought across this past 12 months. It is brilliant to have been back with a full schedule of in person activity this year.

Thank you to those who enjoyed the enjoyment I get from being on the microphone and allowed me to host events of yours from the Aviva Stadium to Tallaght Stadium, the Sport Ireland Campus to Dromoland Castle and many more between.

Thank you to those who have listened to the Sport for Business Podcasts which found their feet in 2023 and will be in greater evidence with some exciting new series planned for 2024.

Thank you for the thousands of emails, whats apps, messages, phone calls and buttonholes that have all been a part of my seeming to be on top of the subject matter that unites us. Every one of them is appreciated and if I am sometimes a little slower to respond than is ideal it is just because there are so many. Thanks for your patience, I will get back to you.

Thank you to those who have been part of the journey but who may not quite yet have come over to our membership. Perhaps 2024 will be the year when we get to do more together.

Thank you to the administrators of sport that form a key part of our audience and whose work is the basis of much of what we comment on. It is never the most rewarding of roles in the glory that often attaches to sport but without you none of it would happen. If nobody says well done to you, say it to yourself and know that you are an essential part of sport.

Thank you to the volunteers that are the rock on which Irish sport is built. We know that there is an immense reward from enabling people to play and to be physically active, but it is not financial, it is not in time, it is often not in recognition. Instead it is in the moments of a skill mastered by a child, completed by someone that was told it was not for them. Treasure the moments and keep on showing up.

Thank you to the players that inspire us at every point on the scale from the most humble grassroots training session to the World Cups and World Championship events.

Thank you to the sponsors and the businesses that are a vital part of how we enjoy and consume sport, from sponsors to agencies, media to service suppliers and everyone else that plays a part.,

Thank you finally to my family whose permission to try something new has enabled me to find a working life that inspires and excites me every single morning.

Let’s do it all again together in 2024.

Rob