Special Olympics Volunteer Diary - Day 6

It's a shorter working day today and the athletes have the afternoon off to prepare for a special expedition to Blanchardstown Shopping Centre. I am assigned to runner duties, which today consists of mainly crowd control* as the sports centre has a long queue of spectators waiting to see a match.

The last two games of the day both involve Ireland, so the crowd's expectations are high as we run them through their cheering and Mexican wave paces. Ireland 1 are playing Argentina, who very quickly go 25-0 up within five minutes. Looking at the officials' faces it is clear that something is wrong - it seems Argentina may not have used "best endeavours" during the divisioning process and so are playing in a lower division than their current abilities are showing. If this is true, then the team face disqualification...

* = always needed when Ireland were playing - the turnout of supporters was huge

Click here for Day 7.