Despite overwhelming opposition, the DUP seem determined to foist the Maze white elephant on Northern Ireland's sports.

As Lawrie Sanchez's Green And White Army marched up to 33rd, equalling their highest ever position in FIFA's rankigns, the DUP were plotting the destruction of that same side. Tonight the "Democratic" Unionist Party outraged Northern Ireland football fans when they hinted that a decision would be made to build the new "stadium for Ulster" at the Maze. Speaking on BBC Newsline tonight (no online stories yet) Ian Paisley Jr, who has already admitted his interests are in motorsport and not football or rugby (and certainly not GAA), all but confirmed that he and his DUP colleagues would consign Northern Ireland's football team to playing their matches in a half empty stadium designed for another sport and built in a field outside Lisburn beside a museum to the loyalist and republican terrorists that blighted this country for decades, despite the opposition of the vast majority of rugby and football fans and ambivalence from the anchor tenants, the GAA.

There have been allegations that some Lisburn unionists see Lisburn as a new symbol of "Protestant Ulster" and view the idea of a stadium at the Maze as some kind of jewel in the crown (despite the fact the stadium won't actually be in Lisburn!). Have any of our local hacks pointed out the irony of this given that it will be helping fund a Bobby Sands memorial museum centre for conflict whateverthehelltheyr'ecallingitthisweek and the fact that the major use will be for... (wait for it)... Sunday sport!!?. Have they fk!

The local coverage of the stadium issue in the media has been pathetic, with "journalists" for the most part content to rehash NIO press releases and pass them off as reporting. You wouldn't be surprised from a state broadcaster like the BBC but the Belfast Telegraph and UTV have been worse for the most part.

They've all sat back and allowed shocking comparisons between the Maze and MK Dons' stadium (in a built up area with many times the catchment), Wembley stadium (ditto) and completely ignored the received wisdom of Juventus (built a stadium out of town and had to massively reduce its size because nobody was going) and Galatasary (ground derided by Liverpool fans there for the Champions League final as a nightmare to get to/from) and umpteen out-of-town stadia developed for baseball in the USA in the 80s.

Belfast City Council seem to have given up the ghost too. We've heard a lot of talk from them about building a stadium at Ormeau Park but for the last lot of months now there have been no new announcements or any signs of progress.

For all the gassing our new overlords do about being better than direct rule ministers, it appears they're content to make the same mistakes. They're just going to make them more quickly.

The Amalgamation of Northern Ireland Supporters Clubs aren't giving up though and are meeting with the Irish FA and with MLAs to try and persuade them to do the right thing. They have called on the new minister for DCAL, Edwin Poots (DUP) to ensure that the information on the decision-making process which he previously complained wasn't publicly available, and was withheld even following freedom of information requests, is placed in the public domain.