Solomon's Sporting Judgment
I'm an avid soccer fan who spends much of his weekend watching under 10s chasing a ball around a pitch, so I'm not about to begrudge the Executive's cash injection for soccer stadia. I wasn't brought up on a diet of GAA, but I've always found Gaelic football exciting to watch and once, memorably, found myself trying to coach a class of under 8s in the skills of a game I didn't properly understand (cue shouts of "Mister, that's not how you do a toe tap"). So fair play to them too.
But could the ministers behind yesterday's "good news" announcement on cash for sports have misjudged the electorate? Today's Nolan Show seemed stacked with callers demanding not just a different balance between mainstream and smaller sport funding, but a diversion of funds from stadia to health and education.
The Culture Minister Nelson McCausland has hit back, arguing that stimulating sporting interest and participation should raise general health levels amongst the public?
But one aspect of the announcement which is questionable is its very symmetry. If the Executive took a needs based approach rather than a politically expedient route, would both the GAA and Soccer require exactly £61.4 million? I know it's a sporting cliche to talk about a "game of two halves", but is this the sporting equivalent of the judgment of Solomon?
It stirs memories of the symmetrical solution to the Victims Commissioner dillemma - we can't agree on one so let's appoint four. Since then the departure of Mike Nesbitt meant the Commission reduced in number to three, but has anyone been demanding a restoration of the previous symmetry?
I'm 
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