Alan Farrell (Dublin Fingal, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I appreciate that it was not under Mr. Doyle's control. Although on a matter completely unrelated to this committee, it was perhaps timely of Warren Deutrom of Cricket Ireland to send me an e-mail at 9 a.m. today. He lives across the street from the area he talks about, one which will involve the Department of Transport, Tourism and Sport in the near future, and I hope it will also involve the Minister and Ministers of State. In the context of developing other sports and in looking at strategies for the likes of National Sports Campus Development Authority and the potential investment across the range of services provided by the Department of Transport, Tourism and Sport, the Department must not just be about sport and transport but must also look at the tourism potential of sport.

For example, 600 million people in India watched a match that was televised in Malahide a couple of years ago. These are markets we are simply unaware of. This sport is considered a minority sport in Ireland and yet it has incredible reach. Cricket in Ireland is about to go up a level in the league structure, which offers incredible potential to Ireland to put its foot in the door of the super league of cricket internationally. Despite this, we do not have a national stadium or arena for the development of the sport. Cricket Ireland has quadrupled its membership in four years. We are talking about an explosion in support, and not just in the north of Dublin. It is also happening elsewhere. There is an active cricket club in each of the 32 counties in the island of Ireland. This should be considered by the Department. I appreciate the Chairman's leeway to me, but I believe the Department should consider this in terms of future planning whenever the policy decision might arise. I wanted to take the opportunity to address that.