WHILE para dressage riders welcomed their new High Performance manager this week, event riders are still in limbo about theirs, as well as the national eventing calendar.

Irish Olympian Joseph Murphy, who has moved his string to the UK amid the uncertainty, said not having a manager was “absolutely ridiculous” and eventing in Ireland was “crumbling from the top down”.

“It’s absolutely ridiculous that we don’t have a manager, it’s almost embarrassing. I’m over here and the first thing people ask is about your programme, your training and we just don’t know. We don’t have a manager and that is the responsibility of Horse Sport Ireland. Everybody is passing us out, because they have so much backing. It’s crumbling from the top down.”

With regard to the eventing calendar, Murphy said it was impacting riders of all levels. “All the different levels of horse and rider need different things and basically, Eventing Ireland are not able to provide that. I’m lucky I’m a northern region member, as this region is full steam ahead, but as for the EI calendar from year to year, there’s no continuity and I can’t take the risk personally in staying at home. If I want to go to a big competition in the spring, I have to make sure I have the horses ready. I’m down about five horses this spring because I don’t know if I can take a horse from an owner and be able to get it to events. For a country that produces so many good riders and horses, the organisations are really, really letting us down.

“It’s not new for me to come to the UK in the springtime, but this year in particular I knew that it was definite because of what was happening. The people I really feel sorry for that keep the sport going in our country are the amateurs and the grassroots riders, they don’t know if they’re going to get to an event this year.

“I’m really not the worst affected, it’s the people that are working other jobs or trying to produce young horses to make a living on, the parents that have to get their kids out of school to bring them to England to get MERS. I just want to see this sport going forward in a positive way, but the current atmosphere is not healthy at all.”

Disillusioned

Olympian Sarah Ennis was of a similar view. “From the great spirit we had last year and the results to this situation, where we have no manager and no trainers, is so disappointing. We have a good team spirit, but in a European Championship year and with Badminton six weeks away, we have no training programme - where are we even going to get trainers at this point? We are blessed with generous owners, who kept horses for Team Ireland and they are totally disillusioned,” Ennis said.

Four-time Olympian and 2023 Maryland 5* winner Austin O’Connor is equally disappointed. “We’re completely in the dark. It’s a big championship year and there’s been absolutely no communication from HSI to the riders. I think the most disheartening bit about it really is Irish eventing results have very much been on the up across the board and the investments in and retention of horses and from owners has been starting to pay serious dividends.

“The talk last year was building towards the next Olympics, well, when is that going to start? The focus now is to make sure the owners don’t become disillusioned. Being based in the UK, where we’ve got an array of world-class riders, we’re all fighting for the same owners, but once again, we’re probably the only nation in the world without any form of a plan going forward.”

HSI said appointment of a high performance eventing manager would be finalised ‘very shortly’.

At time of print, Eventing Ireland had just published three provisional dates for southern events, with the rest of the calendar to be populated “once the insurance and supporting policies are in place”.

The dates include: Frankfort Stud (EI80-110), April 13th; Crecora (EI80-115), April 20th; Lisgarvan House (EI80-120), May 11th.