SPORTS> Feature and Column
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SPORTS> Feature and Column
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Baseball-Ireland pitches for the big time
(Reuters)
Updated: 2006-07-26 12:49 Funded almost entirely on credit cards, "The Emerald Diamond" took two years to make as Fitzgerald -- who was working a full-time job -- found the issue of eligibility haunting him again. "Each avenue I went down I found that for the Irish grants I wasn't eligible because I was American and for the American grants I wasn't eligible because I was shooting in Europe," he told Reuters by telephone from New York. Though baseball remains a minority sport in Ireland, its supporters point to the rapid growth of Little Leagues in the country as evidence of its increasing popularity -- but they worry about its future. The International Olympic Committee (IOC) decided last year to drop baseball from the Olympics after the 2008 Games, which means Baseball Ireland will lose half its current funding.
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