GLASGOW 2018 is now underway, with yesterday’s preliminary rounds of the gymnastics, rowing and cycling kicking things off.
Almost four years to the day since the 2014 Commonwealth Games concluded, another major, multi-sport event is being held in the city and while these European Championships have enjoyed slightly less pre-event hype than the Commonwealth Games did, it seems likely that they will be equally successful both in terms of the on-field action and the cultural festival accompanying it.
In the sport, the Scots may be competing under the banner of GB rather than Scotland but if current form is anything to go by, there should be plenty for the home crowd to celebrate.
Particular highlights are likely to come in the pool with Ross Murdoch, Hannah Miley and Duncan Scott, in the velodrome with Olympic champion Katie Archibald, Jack Carlin and Neah Evans and in Gleneagles, Catriona Matthew, as well as Michele Thomson and Richie Ramsay, will be aiming to win an historic gold medal in golf, with their sport never having held a European Championships previously.
What this list of potential medallists proves is that when it comes to elite sport, Scotland is punching above its weight in remarkable fashion. No longer is it only the odd Scot here and there who is challenging for medals on the world stage; rather, there is a lengthy list and even more encouragingly, there is a group emerging behind these athletes who promises to replace them when the opportunity arises.
It is hard to find many downsides of Glasgow’s emergence as a destination city when it comes to major sporting events – it is not only the Commonwealth Games and European Championships which have come here but also a number of individual sport’s major championships have been held in Glasgow in recent years.
These events unquestionably provide a platform to sell Glasgow and Scotland to the world but there is one issue. The idea of these events is often sold to the public on the basis that they will increase participation levels and encourage the population as a whole to become more active.
This is an utter myth, and needs to stop being used to promote major sporting events until there is some concrete evidence that there is any significant positive impact on participation levels as a result of major sporting events coming to these shores.
Glasgow 2014 was built on the promise there would be a legacy for Glasgow and Scotland but the final legacy report, which was released on the eve of this year’s Commonwealth Games in Australia, noted that those Games four years ago had yet to yield any negligible change in levels of physical activity in Scotland. This chimes with the findings of an interim report by the Health and Sport Committee of the Scottish Parliament, who wrote that “they saw no current evidence on an active legacy from the 2014 Games.” It is a depressing, if unsurprising, conclusion. No major sporting event anywhere in the world has ever been proven to increase participation levels long-term.
I’m all for Scotland attracting more of these sports events – and I know I would have loved to have competed in one – but there remains a serious disconnect between these events and any kind of serious, joined-up plan to improve activity levels. Few people I know really look at the likes of Ross Murdoch, Katie Archibald et al and believe they can emulate them. Only kids who are already heavily involved in sport glean significant inspiration and motivation from these athletes.
Instead of attempting to encourage kids to become the next Murdoch or Archibald, serious money should be invested in making sport and activity far cheaper and more accessible than it currently is. The Daily Mile remains one of the most ingenious ideas developed in Scotland but too many schools still don’t participate.
The European Championships will, I’m sure, be a great couple of weeks. But unless there is a real change in thinking from the government and local councils, a few years from now we will once again be having the conversation of why there was no increase in participation off the back of it.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here