By Kevin Mullan

Copyright derryjournal

The Foyle MLA and diehard Derry fan made the claim at Stormont. Mr. Durkan said: “As a season ticket holder, I am very disappointed for Derry City. As a Foyle MLA and a football fan, I am devastated for Institute. “Will the Minister publish in full the options and all advice and recommendations that he received from his officials before he made the decision about how many projects to take forward in each tier? “It is a decision that ensured the exclusion of Derry City, which scored fourth highest overall and has a shovel-ready project. Other clubs scoring much lower and nowhere near ready have been funded.” Sports minister Gordon Lyons rejected Mr. Durkan’s claim, stating it was not possible to compare the scores of clubs across the three tiers of the scheme. With a bid for £11.8m to complete phase two of the Mark Farren Stand and upgrade the artificial pitch and floodlights, the Brandywell club was seeking funding under Tier 3 of the scheme (projects over £6m). Only Glentoran and Cliftonville were allocated monies under this category. Successful Tier 2 applicants (£1.5m to £6m) were Ballinamallard United, Ballymena United, Banbridge Town, Bangor, Carrick Rangers, Dergview, Dungannon Swifts, Glenavon, Larne, Lisburn Rangers, Loughgall, Newry City and Oxford Sunnyside. Tier 1 applicants (bids under £1.5m) going ahead are Armagh City, Ballymacash Sports Academy, Lisburn Distillery, Queen’s University and Rathfriland Rangers. During their exchange Mr. Lyons told Mr. Durkan ‘it is not appropriate to compare different tiers’. The sports minister said he played no role in the compilation of the final list of clubs selected for the £36.2m Stormont fund. Nine Department for Communities officials oversaw the selection of the 20 successful clubs and an independent moderator reviewed the process, said Mr. Lyons. There was consternation locally when bids by Derry City FC and Institute FC were turned down. However, the sports minister rejected claims from Mr. Durkan that the Brandywell club had been turned down unfairly. “Unfortunately, the Member has got a number of things wrong….he clearly does not know the process that was in place, even though I have just outlined that process. “If he had listened to the statement that I have just made, he would realise that it is not appropriate to compare different tiers. That is what he is doing in the example that he gave,” he said. Mr. Lyons said applicants had been asked to estimate their overall project cost and self-select one of three tiers. “The tiers meant that projects were assessed and ranked against others of a similar size. For example, a proposal for a replacement carpet on an existing pitch for a rural club, which might cost around £1m, would not be in direct competition with a major demolition-and-rebuild project costing upwards of £10 million. What that means in practice is that scores are not comparable across tiers,” he stated. The minister said that after the process was opened in January his department received 37 applications with bids for a collective £160 million in financial support. He said the scoring matrix has been publicly available since then and can be viewed on the departmental website. Lyons urged to consider Derry City FC’s £2m North Terrace investment in regional stadia match-funding equation