Julio Maglione, FINA President, has come out fighting for swimming in Olympic circles with a demand for a prompts review of how the spoils of Olympic broadcast revenues are divided.

Sports on show at the London 2012 Games will share around $375 million from the International Olympic Committee's (IOC) TV deals. And get this: athletics will get the biggest share with $35 million, with swimming, the sport that consistently sells its tickets first and is clearly the biggest draw in what has traditionally become (though has not always been the case) the first of the two weeks of action.

The 28 Summer Olympic sports federations are in the process of reviewing the sums in part because of the need to address the global economic downturn. Sports chiefs voted yesterday to alter the system after the London Olympics to make it more representative. But some federations, including FINA, argued that a revision was needed immediately.

President Maglione noted with justification: "The share of TV revenues ... needs to be reviewed now, not in two years. The current distribution does not reflect ... the changes in market appeal and changes in sport." His view is shared by FINA colleagues and is one that director Cornel Marculescu has pressed with the IOC for many a long year. 

Talking to SwimNews, Marculescu confirmed that the crux of the matter is that many sports federations simply do not agree that a deal struck in 1984 - for TV rights in which athletics is alone in group A on twice the amount of money handed out as sports in group B - applies today. "In the interests of fair play, the situation should reflect the reality of the market today. We have spoken to NBC and other broadcast partners and on the statistics we come out 1st place."

FINA, with several other international federations, proposed the formation of a commission to consider contemporary issues relating to an outdated deal.

The IOC distributes the broadcast revenue from Olympic TV deals to the 28 sports, placed in four groups. Federations in the two lower groups are allocated $13 million and $11 million respectively. FINA's other disciplines, diving, water polo, synchro and open water receive funds beyond swimming's pot.

Swimming is among the most watched sports at the Games, and has been so consistently throughout history. Among others sports that believe they do not get a fair share are boxing, handball and table tennis.

The IOC secured a record total of $3.8 billion from broadcast rights for the Winter Olympics in Vancouver that took place in February and for London 2012.

The International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) and world soccer's governing body (FIFA) agreed to give $20 million from the combined TV funds they will receive for the London Games to the other federations.

"I said last year that if our finances are comfortable we would give that (windfall) to the other federations," FIFA chief Sepp Blatter told Reuters. "That is exactly what we will do now."

Federations will receive more money for London 2012 compared to Beijing 2008 as there are only 26 sports on the programme instead of 28. Softball and baseball were voted off for London, with golf and rugby replacing them at the 2016 Olympics.

Two questions arise: the first is in part answered by Sepp Blatter; the second is - why should athletics get twice as much as swimming?  

Blatter recognises that he comes from a very wealthy sport and would be looked upon more kindly if he shared some of that when sitting at the Olympic banquet. What about tennis? And golf? Should they get what swimming gets? 

Many leading officials in swimming think not. Among arguments is this one: the Olympic Games should want to retain its strong links to the traditional sports that have wooed the crowds down the years - and kept the show on the road all through the years when the Olympic arena allowed only amateurs. Down through those years is a trail of hardship and toil and scant reward for amazing feats of athleticism. Professional sports that have had time - a head start of decades, you might say - and opportunity to grow into multi-million businesses, need now to stand in line when it comes to Olympic handouts, say some of the biggest Olympic attractions whose status dates back to 1896.

Athletics is clearly a big draw and it has the advantage of the big arena, the stadium with 60,000 and more (not always full, of course). That is hardly the fault of swimming and other sports: swimming had its biggest audience ever at the London 1908 Games, when more than 60,000 spectators flocked to watched events in the 100m tank in the stadium at White City.

Hard to say precisely what slice of money each sport is worth. Much easier to answer the question: is swimming worth half of athletics? Of course not. Swimming is worth much more - and Olympic bosses must surely know it. The trouble for FINA (and swimming) is a perception that it has five sports, and many outside the sport look not at what swimming gets but what "aquatics" get.  But the figure above quoted for 'swimming' is for all of FINA's five sports.

And the bottom line draws us back to its cousin, the black line in the pool that has witnessed a fair few of the most outstanding moments not only in Olympic history but world sports history, right up there with the greatest, if not laying claim to the pinnacle in the pantheon,  the seven-in-one of Mark Spitz and the eight-in-one of Michael Phelps. What have they been worth to Olympic Games Ltd?