Sport and Law are topics that are discussed regularly and often throughout our country. These 2 important aspects are becoming increasingly intertwined. Over the next few weeks, O’Donovan and Co. Solicitors will be putting together a survey in conjunction with the new UCC Sports Law Clinic and will we be asking your opinion on these matters.
Meanwhile, some interesting issues have a risen regarding recent events in our country that relate to sports and law.
I’m sure many of you are aware that the BT Young Scientist Competition took place in the RDS in Dublin last week. With almost 85,000 Irish secondary schools taking part it was a massive event and is indeed growing in popularity yearly.
One young student, Karen Murphy, from Scoil Mhuire in Carrick-On-Suir carried out a very interesting project highlighting the GAA’s gender inequality. This topic has indeed been to the fore of recent media with discussions regarding the prevalence of males in top administration roles in many of our sporting organisations. Karen’s investigation was carried out via surveys, interviews and statistical analysis concluded unsurprising results such as that:
There is a lot more statistical information available for men’s GAA matches as opposed to women’s
There is more promotion of the men’s game
The men get first priority
Overall, Karen summarised her findings by concluding that although women often put in the same effort as men, they don’t get the same support or recognition.
Another recent topic in the media was regarding the Cork Senior footballers who are, ‘Tucked Away in a Warehouse’. Recently, Paddy Kelly, who recently retired from inter-county football, explained to Kieran Shannon of the Irish Examiner that his former teammates had to set up a makeshift gym themselves in Fermoy. There were no facilities available to the team for strength and conditioning work and so the players set up a temporary gym in a warehouse near their training pitch in Fermoy, Co. Cork. The Cork County Board was criticized for this when comparing facilities with those available in other counties.
In relation to sporting issues, we intend exploring if Irish Law can do more to promote fairness and protect athletes and people involved in sport. We will seek your opinion on these and more issues regarding sport and law in Ireland when we launch our survey shortly.
For more information on the above topics, check out the links below:
http://www.irishtimes.com/sport/young-scientist-highlights-gaa-s-gender-inequality-issue-1.2933258
https://www.balls.ie/gaa/cork-footballers-forced-erect-makeshift-gym-training-356585
Christina Broderick
