Muller reflects on a mission accomplished

Ireland coach Gene Muller watched his side match their best-ever finish at the Euro Hockey Nations Championships on Saturday — and insisted there is plenty more to come. The girls in green ground out a 1-1 draw with Russia in Amsterdam to ensure they topped the relegation pool to finish fifth, equalling their performance on home turf in Dublin in 2005. The result ensures Ireland avoided relegation from Europe’s top tier and will have two shots at qualification for the 2012 Olympics.

Muller has highlighted the relative youth of his side — which has an average age of 23 — as a reason to believe things can only get better. The South African is known for his attention to detail regarding squad composition, and believes he will have struck the right balance between age and experience by the time 2012 hovers into view. “We lose very few players for 2012. With two years experience and maybe an extra 70 caps per player; then it’ll be a very different scenario,” he explained. “Other teams have attrition of players; our team won’t. We’ve taken great pain to bring in players who have to be part of the team three years from now. “We brought them in early, we’re developing them. Other teams suffer that attrition and, sometimes, we’ll gain as other teams are getting worse.” Lisa Jacob’s stunning reverse-stick smash put Ireland in front 13 minutes into Saturday’s clash, but Russian skipper Olga Shentsova batted in a rebound on 33 minutes. Ireland had the better chances throughout but their finishing let them down, a familiar failing and one of a number of sources of frustration to Muller. “The number one milestone wasalways to stay up,” he said. “(But) it was frustrating. We couldn’t put them away and that’s why the result was in the balance right to the end. It needn’t have been like that. “We were sitting pretty until they scored off a mistake. You’re always going to make mistakes but we made consecutive errors right in front of our goal.

“We are young at the back, with only one player over 21 in our back six or seven. When you have that age profile, you have to live with some errors. But there were too many. “There is a correlation between age and things like decision-making. As they get more experience, they will get better.” Germany suffered heartbreak in both the men’s and women’s finals; the former went down 5-3 to England, with the Netherlands taking the women’s decider 3-2. Meanwhile, Munster’s two representatives on the Ireland side have further reason to remember these Europeans fondly. Skipper Eimear Cregan earned her 150th cap at the tournament, with Quins team-mate Cliodhna Sargent reaching the 50-cap milestone. For pictures of the girls receiving their caps, click here. Southern Fried owes a huge debt of gratitude once again to Stephen Findlater, for doing such comprehensive leg-work over in Amsterdam!