Alan Hubbard: Wanted – cool heads for hot seats

The next few months will see British sport conducting its own version of musical chairs as leadership of a number of key organisations changes hands.

The outcome may well be not only a change of personalities, but also of philosophy in organisations including UK Sport, Sport England, the Football Association (FA) and the Premier League.

All will have new chairpersons by the summer, joining the British Olympic Association (BOA) where Lord Coe is already installed as head honcho.

And I predict that new blood will bring major shake-ups in the way our sport is run. Not before time, some might say, with some prestigious names likely to figure in the metamorphosis.

For example, could Sir Clive Woodward be heading back to frontline sports administration as the shock choice as the next chair of UK Sport? He and the outspoken Baroness Tanni Grey-Thompson seem the standout candidates for the key part-time post to be vacated by Baroness Sue Campbell in April.

Could Sir Clive Woodward be heading back to frontline sports administration as the next chair of UK Sport?

I understand the appointment of either would be warmly welcomed by those sports that have suffered savage funding cuts post-2012 as both are likely to be more sympathetic to their needs in the run-up to the Rio 2016 Olympics.

Notably Woodward, 57, the former England rugby guru whose £300,000 ($472,000/€350,000) a year role as director of sport was axed by the BOA in October, who has been critical of UK Sport's draconian "no compromise" policy which, he claims "has left on the starting blocks" those sports missing out on the £347 million ($546 million/€406 million) pot of gold, with the very existence of some threatened. He is calling for a new funding model.

There is no doubt the Government has been taken aback by the furore following the announcement of the cuts imposed by its own sporting arm, with a deluge of protests to Ministers and questions raised in Parliament.

While Sports Minister Hugh Robertson is broadly supportive of UK Sport's policy, saying sports that have failed should "stop whingeing and work to get things right", he does not seem averse to a shift in emphasis, admitting: "We've reached the end of an era at UK Sport and it's time for a fresh approach...the sports want a bit less Dragon's Den and a bit more of an organisation that sits beside them and helps them."

Baroness Sue Campbell adopted former performance director Peter Keen's "no compromise" approach

Sports, including volleyball, basketball, handball and table tennis, which have had their funding slashed or removed are allotted up to 45 minutes each tomorrow for an appeal before the UK Sport board, some of whom, I gather, are no longer entirely comfortable with the "no compromise" approach initially instigated by former performance director Peter Keen and carried out rigidly under Baroness Campbell's stewardship.

British Volleyball has been particularly voluble, with President Richard Callicott – ironically, once UK Sport's chief executive – suggesting the cuts will cause the "utter obliteration" of the sport at elite level.

Similar sentiments were expressed about basketball's legacy here by the NBA commissioner David Stern and British basketball's superstar Luol Deng, of the Chicago Bulls, this week wrote to David Cameron pleading for UK Sport to restore its funding.

Luol Deng wrote to the British Prime Minister after basketball lost its funding

His letter to the Prime Minister says: "We all heard about the 'legacy' that London 2012 was going to bring to sport in the UK and I refuse to sit back and let that legacy be completely demolished for basketball. I, along with other people involved in the game, have put too much in and care too greatly to let this happen.

"The sport of basketball is a pathway, a pathway that teaches so many valuable lessons on and off the court, how are we supposed to motivate these kids to carry along their journey when there's now nothing at the end? No Team GB, no Olympic dream, no goal."

Emotive stuff-but will it fall on deaf ears?

Stephen Mosley, the Conservative member of Parliament for the city of Chester, has secured an adjournment debate in Parliament on "Funding for Basketball" which will take place on Monday night.

Although UK Sport's draconian approach is one with which I fundementally disagree I continue to have much admiration for Baroness Campbell, who, after 10 years as its leader, has reached the maximum term in line with requirements set for such public appointments.

She has also been an effective chair of the Youth Sports Trust and at 63 it is unlikely her sports administrative days are over.

Maybe she will now move over to chair Sport England (where Richard Lewis is also stepping down to concentrate on his prime role in running Wimbledon as the new secretary of the All-England Club), the Government having decided that a proposed merger with UK Sport wouldn't be practical after all.

Both posts are to be advertised this weekend and among other names that might be in the frame for either are Sir Steve Redgrave, Sir Matthew Pinsent, former Sports Minister Richard Caborn, and Howard Wells, the former chair and currently deputy chair of the Sport and Recreation Alliance and ex-chief executive of the Irish FA, recently awarded an OBE for services to sport.

Sir Keith Mills 3113

Is there a more in-demand figure in sport than Sir Keith Mills?

However along with front runners Woodward and Baroness Tanni-Grey Thompson, the latter now impressively making waves in the House of Lords, the name of Sir Keith Mills has to figure prominently in the mix.

Is there a more in-demand figure in sport than the personable Sir Keith?

The man who invented Air Miles and the Nectar card, and was a driving force behind London 2012 as deputy chair to Lord Coe, is the Government's preferred choice to take over from over-age David Bernstein this summer as chairman of the Football Association.

But he is also linked with the same post at the Premier League, which too will become vacant with the unmourned departure of gaffe-prone Sir Dave Richards.

Coe is also leaning heavily on the business expertise of Mills in his own new capacity as chairman of the cash-strapped British Olympic Association where the buzz is that under-fire chief executive Andy Hunt will shortly be replaced.

The Sports Minister would be delighted to see Mills fill one of the soon-to-be-vacant chairs but I gather the 62-year-old yachtsman is not interested in a quango post but might fancy a football role. He is a non-executive director at Tottenham Hotspur.

Robertson's prime concern is to see that football gets it house in order before the need for Government intervention. Mills is able to do that - but is he ready and willing?

It could depend on how much time he wishes to devote to his sailing interests which include an attempt to end the French domination of offshore racing by expanding and commercialising the Open 60 monohull class.

Self-made Mills, who is said to be worth £130 million ($205 million/€152 million), is investing several million euros in the project after abandoning plans for a British America's Cup team, which would have featured Sir Ben Ainslie, apparently losing faith in the US organisers of next year's San Francisco event.

Interesting to see which of his many cards canny Sir Keith plays.

And whether the forthcoming game of musical chairs can strike a more harmonious note amid the current discord, with those cool heads for the hot seats rather than cold hearts.

Alan Hubbard is an award-winning sports columnist for The Independent on Sunday, and a former sports editor of The Observer. He has covered a total of 16 Summer and Winter Olympics, 10 Commonwealth Games, several football World Cups and world title fights from Atlanta to Zaire.