New Zealand has a knack of producing some amazing people. That’s probably why I have never understood the Cotterill compulsion for dashing off to Australia or the UK or Outer Mongolia to find a foreigner to coach the national team or manage the organization. Sport New Zealand does the same thing. The new boss of High Performance Sport is an immigrant from Australia. Maybe Cotterill’s love of things foreign is simply an effort to keep pace with his bosses. I know the Swimming New Zealand website frequently trumpeted the fact that their recruitment drive for a new employee was “worldwide”. I always took that as an admission of weakness rather than a positive.

But seriously the quality of some New Zealand administrators and coaches is outstanding. Because our population is small we tend to have a group of the very, very good people at the top and some pretty mediocre hangers on below that. The previous Swimwatch post listed the names of some world class New Zealand coaches. It is a truly remarkable list – Lydiard, Jelley, Laing, Robertson, Tonks, Henry, Lahore, Allan and Hansen. When Swimming New Zealand was running out of money their decision to retain an American age group coach, when they had good New Zealanders, Donna Bouzaid and Gary Hurring available, was ridiculous. If ever a decision showed the inability of Swimming New Zealand to govern that one did.

Cotterill’s folly is further exposed by the number of New Zealanders being snapped up by foreign organizations. Warren Gatland is the current rugby coach of Wales, Joe Schmidt is coaching the Irish rugby team, Dean Barker has just been employed by the New York Yacht Club to challenge for the America’s Cup. For years Sir Russel Coutts managed the Oracle challenge and defence of the America’s Cup. And it is not only in sport that New Zealanders excel. New Zealander Christopher Liddell is the Deputy Chief of Staff for Policy Coordination in Trump’s White House and Helen Clark has joined the United Nations Global Fund. It seems that Cotterill’s policy of anyone except a New Zealander stands in stark contrast to what the rest of the world thinks.

The attraction of New Zealanders was further highlighted when I read today that a kiwi called Hamish Adams has been appointed as CEO of Athletics Ireland. I like the sound of this guy. He has spent the past five years as CEO of Rowing Ireland and twenty years before that working in professional rugby.

In an interview with the Independent newspaper Adams highlighted the success of Athletics Ireland. Membership has recently passed 60,000. Just think about that for a second. Ireland has the same population as New Zealand, 4.7 million. The Irish athletics federation has 60,000 members. Swimming New Zealand has 19,118. With all his years of foreign help Cotterill has only been able to recruit 30% of the membership of Adams’ Irish organization. It is pathetic.

So why is Swimming New Zealand only 30% of the success of Adams’ Irish federation? Well that is the world’s easiest question. It’s all in the way Adams thinks. His priorities are different from Cotterill, Francis and Johns. So different in fact that Adams would never get a second interview as a coffee maker at Swimming New Zealand.

Adams actually believes and lives the view that the members must have priority access to the organisation’s money. In Swimming New Zealand 92% of their income is spent on administration. Only 8% is paid directly to swimmers. Compare that scandal to what Adams told the Independent, “We need to grow the income of the organisation so we can do more for our members” and “alternative sources of revenue will be explored to ensure athletes don’t feel the brunt”. Those comments alone would be enough to have Cotterill asking Johns to take Adams to the nearest exit.

Adams also seems to understand the limitations of government funding. He says, “Long gone are the days when you could primarily rely on the income streams from Sport Ireland. They have limited budgets as well.” Adams’ opinion contrast starkly with Cotterill who moaned and groaned about High Performance Sport New Zealand’s cut in their handout to swimming. He sounded like a 9^th street junkie searching for a fix. Which is ironic when $1,413,148 (40%) of the sport’s funds still comes out of our taxes.

Adams definitely understands the good fortune of New Zealand administrators. He says, “The investment in New Zealand sport is about five times that of Irish Olympic sport so it is difficult to compare.” Of course all we hear from Swimming New Zealand is their need for more government money. But it looks to me as though there are others far worse off than Cotterill and Johns. Instead of moaning about their misfortune they would do well to take a page out of Adams’ book; raise some private money and pay their swimmers a decent wage.

Adams concludes his interview with the Independent by saying, “I’m excited to be involved in the Athletics Ireland team, there’s a great bunch of people there who are passionate about sport,” he says. “It’s great to be part of something so positive. Onwards and upwards.”

My guess is that is exactly where Athletics Ireland is heading.