A four year period of office, a class 2 table tennis player, Eimear Breathnach succeeds John Fulham, who commencing in 1992 in Barcelona, competed in the 100 metres and 200 metres wheelchair track events at four consecutive Paralympic Games.

Now 42-years-old, Eimear Breathnach participated at the Beijing 2008 and London 2012 Paralympic Games, the latter being her farewell appearance to the international scene.

She made her debut in January 1999 at the International Tournament of the North-West staged in Accrington, an English town of just over 20 miles north of Manchester.

Notably at the European Championships in 2011 in Split, competing in women’s team class 2, she secured bronze alongside Rena McCarron Rooney; two years later when the tournament was staged in Zagreb, it was the same colour, Kathleen Reynolds being added to the line-up.

Additionally, in 2011, she won women’s singles class 1-2 gold at the United States Open in Milwaukee, silver in the German city of Bayreuth and bronze at the British Open in Sheffield.

In August 2002, she reached no.5 in the women’s class 2 listings, her highest ever world ranking.

Always ready for the challenge, another in a different guise now awaits.