Badminton was a surprising omission from the UK Sport funding list when it was announced in December after Marcus Ellis and Chris Langridge claimed bronze in the men's doubles at Rio 2016 to exceed the sport’s medal target for the Games.

But Sport England, which is primarily funded by the National Lottery, has now given Badminton England £2.8 million ($3.5 million/€3.2 million) to develop the next generation of top players.

This is on top of the £7.25 million ($9.04 million/€8.37 million) the non-departmental public body awarded in December to support its regular players.

Badminton England intends to use its funding to develop better technology and training practices so that they can cut the time it takes for a player to reach peak performance, a process which it claims to currently take eight to 12 years.

Additionally, young talented athletes on the England Junior Performance Programme will get individual support and be given access to sport science expertise.

The organisation will also strive to improve training environments and access to coaching by working closely with the National Badminton Centre in Milton Keynes and high-performance environments at a number of universities.

"We are delighted with this funding decision to support our talent pathways," Badminton England chief executive Adrian Christy said.

"We have an exciting generation of young players and this investment will support their development as they aspire to go on to represent England and Great Britain at the highest level."

Weightlifting was also one of the five Olympic sports - along with archery, badminton, fencing and table tennis - which had its UK Sport funding cut entirely for the four-year Tokyo 2020 cycle.

British Weightlifting have been awarded £373,800 ($466,100/€431,300) by Sport England for their development work from 2017 to 2021.

The biggest beneficiaries though are Rugby Football League (RFL) and the Amateur Swimming Association (ASA), who have been given £10,750,000 ($13,405,000/€12,404,000) and £10,560,000 ($13,168,000/€12,184,000) respectively.

However, these sums are considerably less than those of £17.5 million (£21.8 million/€20.2 million) and £23.5 million ($29.3 million/€27.1 million) given in 2013.

Rugby league’s funding will aid the sport’s 95,000 weekly players by supporting clubs and improving coaching, it is claimed. 

It is hoped the funding will also help get more people playing at school and university level and grow rugby league variants such as touch rugby league, tag rugby league and wheelchair rugby league.

Other aims of the RFL are the introduction of more women to the game through the creation of a new Women’s Super League and finding ways of attracting more black, Asian and minority ethnic people into the sport.

Currently, 93 per cent of regular rugby league players are male.

"The Rugby Football League appreciates all of the public funding that has come into the sport," RFL chief executive Nigel Wood said.

"The National Lottery investment from Sport England will assist us in supporting and growing areas that have a strong rugby league player base.

"We understand the need to create new funding streams into all levels of the game if we are to truly maximise the opportunity of hosting the Rugby League World Cup in 2021.

"We have already embarked on a sport-wide transformation with new digital systems and processes which build on strong league and competition management and improvements in player retention."

Swimming is one of the country’s most popular sporting and physical activities, particularly among women and children.

The ASA has told Sport England it will roll out a new "start" programme to help clubs and operators offer free diving, synchronised swimming and water polo taster sessions to the public.

It also plans to recruit more volunteers, continue to develop the swimming workforce and work closer with GPs to help get swimming on the prescription pad and recognised as a valuable complement to medical treatment.

Other funding awards comprise £1,273,800 ($1,588, 400/€1,469,700) to Baseball Softball UK, £999,704 ($1.2 million/€1.2 million) to Taekwondo Organisation Ltd and £410,000 ($511,000/€473,000) to Basketball England.

The investments, which start next month, total £27,167,304 ($33,877,628/€31,346,406).

They follow what Sport England describes as detailed discussions with each governing body about what contribution they can make to their strategy.

All the money is conditional on the recipient meeting the requirements in the Code for Sports Governance, published last year. 

"These are the people who play sport and get active week in, week out, and we want to make sure their experience is so good that they continue to stick with that healthy habit," Phil Smith, Sport England’s director of sport, said.

"National governing bodies of sport know these people well and are in a good position to deliver the quality experience they are looking for."

The latest announcement of grants follows the two previous decision rounds made in December 2016 and February 2017 that saw almost 40 governing bodies awarded £189 million ($236 million/€218 million) of funding.

It means £216 million ($269 million/€249 million) has so far been agreed to help governing bodies deliver their grassroots sport programmes.

However, this is a massive reduction on four years ago, when 46 national governing bodies shared nearly £500 million ($624 million/€577 million) to spend between 2013 and 2017.