An apparent increase in the number of available males is good news for girls, bad for bachelors, writes Roisin Ingle.

With the annual lovefest that is the Lisdoonvarna festival starting today in Co Clare, thoughts for many Irish singletons turn to matters of the heart.

And they can take heart from figures released by the London School of Economics which show the numbers of unattached men under the age of 30 in the UK is higher than at any time since the second World War.

Separate figures from the office for national statistics at Edinburgh University show that, between the ages of 25 and 44, men are twice as likely as women to live, as the Bridget Jones theme tune has it, all by themselves. Brendan Jones is the new Bridget.

Could the same thing happen here? Unfortunately, official statistics from this country are not as encouraging for Irish female singletons. While CSO figures reveal 10,000 more men around between the ages of 18 and 27, urban centres are generally populated by more women than men. Across the regions, the genders are more evenly spread.

"Our experience is that we get as many men as women applying for our services," says Michael O'Connell of the Circles Club dating agency. "The perception is always that there are more single women around, but we put this down to the fact that women socialise more in groups - so it looks as though there are more of them. The reality is, from our records, that there are the same numbers of each gender looking for relationships."

There are, however, still a couple of places where the canny unattached female is more likely to be spoilt for romantic choice in Ireland and one of those is the matchmaking festival at Lisdoonvarna.

Willie Daly, one of the official matchmakers for the festival, says that, for most of the week-long dating festival, single men outnumber single women by a ratio of eight to one.

"The traditional reason in rural areas is that most of the properties and businesses are still left to the sons which leaves the daughter out of the picture," he says. "The daughter then goes and heads off to the city, or these days it's sometimes because they are looking for adventure. That leaves a lot of men in rural areas looking for a woman and we see a lot of them at the festival."

But Irish women would be well-advised to get in there quickly or risk being frozen out by foreign competition. Daly says, since EU accession, he has been busier than ever coping with applications from women from Eastern European countries seeking Irish men.

"These are sweet-mannered, beautiful young girls who are not concerned about the age difference. They may be in their late 20s but they are generally looking for men aged between 45 and 60," he says. "I say to them 'what would a lovely young girl like you want with an older man?' but they say there is more security with the more mature man. In some ways, it's like the clock going back to an Ireland where age is not the issue that for some Irish women it has become."

The other place single men are plentiful is online, with some agencies reporting large amounts of men seeking their services. The newest of these, Woo.ie, has found that 63 per cent of their clients are men, most of them between the ages of 25 and 34. The group of twentysomethings on the southside of Dublin who run Woo.ie are not quite sure why this is the case.

"It could just be because online dating is easier and more fun, and our site particularly has a younger feel than some of our competitors. Although we have a male majority, it doesn't seem to affect the number of dates, pair-offs and couples that emerge from our site," says Fiona O'Riordain of Woo.

"This could be because men tend to frequent the site for shorter time periods, whereas women spend longer periods of time chatting on Woo and really getting to know other male members." She says that the first section men seem to click on is the 18-to-25 section "even if they are 45 themselves".

But it's not just the new kids on the internet dating block who are seeing a rise in male clients. Grainne Barry of Another Friend.com, an established dating agency, reports 56 per cent of its members are male.

"It's a definite trend now and men don't have it as easy as they used to," she says. "If a new girl comes online, within 24 hours it's possible that she could have 10 males interested in her - more if she puts up a photo. A man will be lucky if he gets two potential mates in that time . . . although this could also be because men are a bit lazier about filling in their online profile properly."

She believes the Bridget Jones scenario is increasingly valid for men. "The men are just as keen from our experience. Brendan Jones is a reality and is in exactly the same situation as Bridget - it's just that they are not as open about it. These days, guys do have to work a bit harder which makes a nice change."