There is something rotten in the state of swimming Down Under. So begins an article in The Australian today by Nicole Jeffery under the headline "Australian swimming's fortunes set to plunge as it veers off the golden pathway".
Swimming, says the respected journalist, has been "the gold standard among Australia's Olympic sports". But, she says, "worrying cracks are appearing in the foundations of the medal factory upon which Australia's glowing Olympic reputation is built. The only reason that Australia has been able to punch well above it weight in the race pool, suggests the article is that those who have run the sport Down Under have been more efficient than their rivals overseas
Jeffery writes: "The coach-driven approach has been the key to that elite success since Don Talbot was appointed as Australia's first full-time head coach in 1989. Without a common sense of purpose from both the administration and team management, success in the pool will be more elusive than it has been since the bad old days of the 1980s, when Australian gold medals were a rarity rather than a given."
She adds: "Under current chief executive Kevin Neil, there has been a purge of key staff and officials at Swimming Australia, which has left the administration without corporate memory or understanding of the principles that underpinned the golden era of the past two decades."
Read the rest of an excellent, telling and incisive view of the state of swimming Down Under as rivals smell blood in a week that has seen Australian head coach Alan Thompson quit his job over disagreements with a Swimming Australia Board at odds with some of those who have served the sport so well over the past 20 years.
Meanwhile, Todd Balym at the Daily Telegraph reveals that national-team swimmers and leading coaches have been "gagged from talking about the departure of head coach Alan Thompson, with Swimming Australia continuing a recent theme of preventing freedom of speech from within the team."
Under such circumstances, Swimming Australia looks like a federation in need of some media advice but then that might be harder these days given that the man who ran media services so extremely well for SAL since 1991, is no longer there to provide the sound words of wisdom that appear no longer to be reaching those in charge Down Under.
Some serious challenges for the world's No2 (a precarious place for any nation given the might of the USA one way and the growing strengths of several sharks circling the Dolphins) swim nation.
