Gavan Reilly: A Dublin Olympics wasn’t a daft idea … and wouldn’t be now

I was lucky enough to be at the football final last Sunday. Not lucky in the sense that I witnessed a classic match, but rather that I got to see one more Croke Park visit for the magnificent 1999 jubilee team on whose successes I was raised.

I happened to be sitting behind two Englishmen, one of whom had never been in the great cathedral before. He was aghast when I mentioned that the continual stands, from the Cusack through the Davin and over to the Hogan, had been built in three separate projects which meant the stadium was never shut. Where Wembley was shut for six years to be rebuilt, not a single game had to be moved out of Croker.

As the sporting world shifts attention from Ballybough to Paris, it’s a reminder that when it really wants to, Ireland is capable of great infrastructural things for universal benefit. Páirc Uí Chaoimh might have been more expensive than planned, but it’s built and serving its public. Thomond Park is a great facility for Limerick. Windsor Park and Ravenhill are compact, lovely grounds for their sports. With any luck, eventually, Casement Park will be too.

All of this brought to mind the infamous idea floated by Gay Mitchell in 1992. He was Lord Mayor of Dublin when Barcelona – twinned with the capital – had just hosted the Olympic Games. The decline of a charming city was arrested with a major injection of infrastructure and housing. Why, he wondered, couldn’t Dublin do the same?

It was scoffed at then, and would likely be scoffed at now. But there was a hidden logic: the feasibility reports commissioned in 14 different areas, from facilities to financing, culture to communications, still forced a reckoning for civil authorities about what Ireland might need as a major event host.

And other projects did come. The Dublin 2016 project was the reason that the Notre Dame v Navy game in Croke Park – where only the ‘New’ Cusack Stand was built – was the first collegiate game outside of America. The three opening stages of the 1998 Tour de France, a major communications and infrastructural challenge, were successfully held here. Then we hosted the Special Olympics. Now we’re co-hosting Euro 2028. The Ryder Cup is here in 2027. A bid is being examined for The Open.

Is the Olympics really beyond us? It’s true that a country of this size probably has no need for a velodrome, and finding temporary venues for dozens of sports would challenge. But Australia, which has a population only three times that of this island, will host in Brisbane in 2032 having already had Sydney 2000. The facilities built for Sydney are part of why Australia continually outperforms its size on the medals tables. The infrastructure of Beijing 2008 is the reason China does likewise. Plus: it’s not like we wouldn’t find good housing use from an athletes’ village.

If we want to cultivate a whole generation of Mona McSharrys and Rhadisat Adelekes, pitching for a big event wouldn’t be any harm. And for those who think we couldn’t afford it: the Paris games are costing €11 billion, one-sixth of a bank bailout.