Irish senior women’s coach Darren Smith says he is willing to support high performance hockey in Munster – but that the drive must come from within the province.
The province has been struggling with a dwindling international representation on both the men’s and women’s national teams in recent years, with no regional training programme currently in place for those with designs on an Irish jersey.
Smith, who took over in January, reduced the Munster representation in the Irish women’s panel to just two – Audrey O’Flynn (pictured with Smith, below) and Naomi Carroll – earlier this year, dropping experienced campaigners Cliodhna Sargent, Aine Connery, Sinead McCarthy and Miriam Crowley, all of whom have an association with the province.
But the New Zealander brought his charges to University College Cork last week for a training camp and says if a regional high performance training programme is put in place, he will actively support it.
“There’s some good, smart people in Munster, and between the province itself and Irish hockey we can help build it up again to produce the kind of players it has in the past,” he said.
“I think it’s important that there’s an internal drive to make it sustainable so it sits in place forever. If it’s put in place by me, there’s every chance it will fall over when the next guy comes in.
[pullquote]“I think it’s important that there’s an internal drive to make a high performance structure in Munster sustainable, so it sits in place forever. If it’s put in place by me, there’s every chance it will fall over when the next guy comes in.”[/pullquote]
“For me to make an impact in Munster, I need a high performance structure here to work off. If I’m trying to set that structure up while trying to push the national team, probably it’ll be a very thin structure aimed at a couple of players, and it’ll be done with minimal time because I have to keep my eye on the ball here.
“But if there’s a nice little structure sitting in the region, I know I can add value to that. I would certainly be down here on a regular basis working in such a structure, but it’s a hard one for me to set up.”
Smith, who yesterday named an 18-strong squad for next month’s EuroHockey Nations Championships in Belgium, said he hoped the players left off the Irish panel would bounce back.
“The girls were surprised, yeah,” he said. “They’re all proud, good people and I didn’t enjoy letting them know that we’re not going to have them with us.
“But I was also hopeful that the feedback they got from me is that the door isn’t closed. Those girls are talented, we’ve given someone else a go for this summer but I’m hopeful they’ll come back stronger and we see them back in an Irish jersey, playing really well.”
Smith also outlined his blueprint for the coming years, indicating he will move away from the centralised programme favoured by his predecessor Gene Muller. He is instead passionate and enthusiastic about regional development, which guides his ideas on how he would like to see the Irish club season structured. He would like to see the Irish Hockey League expanded into two blocks – nominally, November and March/April – with players released to their clubs for the entirety of those periods, allowing for increased certainty of player availability.
“You need to be careful with what system you set up. Asking players to move to Dublin and centralise them… We perhaps don’t have the resources to do that. It’s quite a tough ask,” Smith said.
“We need contact hours, we can’t make an impact in international hockey without those. But club hockey also plays a hugely important role, those players become the leader in their club and they filter the information from the national programme downwards. I think it would be a mistake to have the players out of club hockey, but we’ve to be very careful how we structure it.”
[pullquote align=”right”]“You need to be careful with what system you set up. Asking players to move to Dublin and centralise them… We perhaps don’t have the resources to do that. It’s quite a tough ask.”[/pullquote]
The primary benefits Smith sees are that the players will have a greater advance awareness of their yearly schedule, while clubs will get longer, uninterrupted access to their internationals for IHL periods.
Smith says he looks forward to instead be able to attend club sessions and help out if required, rather than pulling the players in multiple directions at once. He adds that he is also aware of the requirements of other club players and coaches.
“At the moment my guy feeling is we play too many games, and too many of them aren’t of a high standard. At the same time, we don’t want to set up an All-Ireland League that is a grind; if you do that, you’ll have a very young IHL. You’ll find a lot of the older players will start playing social hockey or drop down a grade so they don’t have that commitment.
“It’s a bit of a catch 22, but Andrew (Meredith, Irish men’s coach) is of a similar mindset and a lot people I’ve spoken to in the clubs do too. They want a club season that really works and dovetails into the national programme, and vice-versa.”
For the upcoming Europeans, Smith has made seven changes to the panel that endured a torrid time at the World League 2 in February.
The aforementioned Sargent, Connery and McCarthy make up three of those while Michelle Harvey, Pamela Smithwick, Nikki Evans and Katie Mullan also miss out this time around.
Naomi Carroll (pictured, above), Gillian Pinder and goalkeeper Grace O’Flanagan will compete at their first major tournament in green while Shirley McCay, Lizzie Colvin, Megan Frazer and Niamh Small all bring plenty of experience to the fray. Niamh Atchler’s inclusion is subject to a fitness test later this month.
While acknowledging that he endured a far from ideal start to his tenure, Smith says he has a clear vision of how he wants his side to play as they prepare for a tough Euros assignment having been grouped with hosts Belgium, Olympic champions Netherlands and WL2 bogey side Belarus.
“I’ve a certain way I like to see hockey played, and I think Irish people’s nature is similar,” he offers.
“I like to see it played aggressively, I like to see attack and a high work rate. Irish people play their sports very aggressively – rugby and GAA especially – and I’d like to see a hockey team that plays with a bit of tempo as well. That’s how we’ve tried to set it up.”
IRELAND senior women’s squad for EuroHockey Nations Championships, August 17-25, Belgium: N Atcheler (UCD)*, Naomi Carroll (Catholic Institute), Lizzie Colvin (Loreto), Nicci Daly (Loreto), Megan Frazer (Ballymoney), Emma Gray (GK, Hermes), Nicola Gray (UCD), Lisa Jacob (Hermes), Shirley McCay (Old Alex), Anna O’Flanagan (UCD), Grace O’Flanagan (GK, Railway Union), Audrey O’Flynn (Hermes), Gillian Pinder (Hermes), Niamh Small (Loreto), Emma Smyth (Railway Union, vice capt), Alex Speers (Railway Union, capt), Nikki Symmons (Loreto), Chloe Watkins (UCD).
Excellent article interesting to hear his views!