Sport and govt taxes a situation, pun intended. There is a spectrum of what contstitutes a sport, and it is not clear cut. I have no problem with the govt funding sports that take little effort, but not for third rate events like the Commonwealth Games that reqiore tens of thousands to send senior citizens across the globe.
Ping pong is more of a sport than shuffleboard because it is more intense, it requires a degree of skill, movement and judgement that a more stationary game like shuffleboard does not. We understand the word sport to mean movement and action. Poker is not a sport because you're sitting.
Shuffleboard, darts, bowling and lawn bowling are sports, but with low intensity levels. Hockey, football, basketball, soccer, wrestling I put at the opposite end of the combat-invasive spectrum. Most other sports fit in-between like tennis, swimming, track and field, rowing, triathalon.