Basketball: UK Sport Olympic funding hope for popular sport

Basketball has been given fresh hope of receiving UK Sport funding after the body said it would take participation levels into account for the first time.

The government agency will continue to focus on sports with medal chances but participation will be used as a factor in sports unlikely to win a medal.
Last year, basketball's funding was stopped because it stood little chance of winning an Olympic medal in 2016.

Nearly 218,000 14 to 16-year-olds play basketball in the UK every week.
Participation levels will not guarantee funding for sports such as basketball, synchronised swimming and water polo, which all saw their funding cut ahead of Rio 2016.
However, Minister for Sport Helen Grant said: "I am pleased that UK Sport is open to taking the broader value of its investment into account in its funding decisions."
UK Sport will also continue to invest primarily in athletes believed to be within eight years of winning a medal, but will consider funding for a longer period of time "where there is a performance need and if finances allow".

Analysis from BBC sports editor Dan Roan
UK Sport's no compromise medals-based approach has been credited with Team GB's success in recent Games so it should be no surprise that they have remained loyal to a method that has served them well.
However, after concerns that this worked against emerging sports such as basketball that have had funding cuts in recent times, UK Sport does offer a small concession, saying it will consider participation levels as a criteria for investment for the first time.
That will come as a relief to some sports but for others it won't go far enough. And, with an election to come, this strategy may be even be reviewed with a change of government.

UK Sport annually invests around £100m of National Lottery and government money into high-performance sports.
The agency's funding criteria, which has been based purely on performance, helped Britain move from 36th in the Olympic medal table at the 1996 Games in Atlanta to third at London 2012 with 65 medals.
In 2014, basketball was one of seven sports which had its money withdrawn controversially but in November the sport received £1.18m of emergency funding from Sport England after the government intervened.
Meanwhile, Sport England has taken £1.53m from the governing bodies of swimming, rugby league, gymnastics and horse riding because they failed to meet participation targets.
The money will be "reinvested in alternative projects to explore new ways of producing better results in those sports" according to a Sport England statement.
The organisation's chief executive Jennie Price, said: "Sometimes we need to take tough decisions to protect our much-needed investment in grassroots sport. Today is one of those times.
"We invest significant sums of money in national governing bodies of sport to get more people active. But we can't ignore falling numbers and missed targets."