Hourihane: People don’t see sacrifices I put in
His Bandon accent doesn’t quite reach the same caustic shrill of exasperation as, say, a certain someone from Mayfield, but there could be no denying that this was Conor Hourihane channelling his inner Roy.
As he castigated the attitude of the young, wealthy, modern professional footballer, it felt as if he had been keen get it all off his chest for some time. Hourihane wasn’t ranting or raving, yet the clinical tone he struck with his criticisms was piercing.
This is a 28-year-old at the height of his powers, as opposed to a stale old pro who missed the boat with the mega-bucks and is now swimming in a sea of bitterness.
Hourihane is a Premier League player with Aston Villa after last month’s play-off victory, he has worked his way to the top from League Two and, this Friday in Copenhagen, will be a key component in the Republic of Ireland’s midfield against Denmark for what is a crucial Euro 2020 qualifier.
He continues to scale the mountain and sees those who should be trying hardest to overtake him content at base camp. It angers him, frustrates him but, ultimately, it benefits him.
“At the end of it, I’m fully focused on my career and I don’t have enough energy to be wasting on others,” he says.
Hourihane suffered from a similar affliction as a teenager at Sunderland, before moving to Ipswich Town and then Plymouth where, he admits, “the penny dropped” and meant moves to Barnsley and then Villa were well-earned fruits of his labour. Riches will soon follow but that was never the aim of the journey.
Some of these lads now are maybe 21 or 22, you see them going on loan now and they come back to the training ground going: ‘Oh, I don’t want to go back there again’ so you think: ‘Alright, let’s see what you’re about and work harder then’, and they don’t do it. That’s their choice in life.
“I just work hard every single day. People don’t see the sacrifices I put in or other people put in. I’m a true believer that hard work pays off. You really have to make huge sacrifices in your career to sustain [yourself] at a good level. I think some young lads in this day and age don’t realise that.
“They’re in this bubble of training until 12 o’clock, coming off the training pitch and doing no extras, playing pool, training in this luxury training ground, heading home and playing on their games console and two years later when their apprenticeship is finished they’re going: ‘What am I going to do now?’ And that’s the realisation of it,” Hourihane continues.
“I don’t see any young lads grabbing a bag of balls and doing extra work, at all the clubs I’ve been at. They’re in this bubble training from nine to 12, having free food, nice breakfast, nice lunch, playing table tennis, playing pool.
“They don’t put in the hard work and two years later they’re wondering where they go from there. That’s the sad thing to see. Lads don’t realise it. They’re working harder on the table tennis table than they do in training.
“The senior lads are out there for an extra hour working on their game. Young lads should see that and take inspiration from it, but they don’t.
Derek McGrath and Ger Cunningham review the weekend's hurling with Anthony Daly
“It’s their choice at the end of the day. You say to them a couple of times; you’ll make a smart remark when you’re walking past them when they’re playing table tennis. You don’t give up on them, but there are only so many things you can say and then it’s up to themselves to kick into gear.”
Hourihane speaks with almost a sense of relief that he was one of the few to cop on in time to salvage a career. It’s a decade since he became a professional at Sunderland — following two years as an apprentice — so it’s not a bad time to reflect.
“You have to survive at the start because it’s a cut-throat business,” he feels. “There are loads of players who come over and go home again.
“I was close to that when I went down to Plymouth. It was my last resort. It was sink or swim and that was probably the kick up the backside that I needed.
“I went in on my days off and probably from that moment moving forward, that switch in myself has never left me. I’ve kind of survived the first 10 years and if you’re lucky enough to do that, that’s great.
“It’s an opportunity in life that came my way and sometimes you have to grasp those opportunities and that was certainly one I had to grasp otherwise it probably would have been the end of the road for me and I would have gone back home.
“Heading back home, with my bags packed, was something I never wanted. I was close to it if I’m being brutally honest. There are plenty of lads who have gone home and done okay for themselves in other walks of life. That’s what I would have felt, that I’d let my mum and dad down.
Going back to those two play-off final wins, those days are happy for myself but they are more about me being happy for mum and dad, them up in the stands, raw emotion, the tears, the special times.
"And that’s what it’s all about.”
Hard work alone has not helped Hourihane reach a stage in his professional life where he feels comfortable and secure. As well as all the extras he does on the training pitch and in the gym, he has also become a regular visitor to a psychologist in order to bring a sense of calm to the madness around him.
“It’s something you have to do yourself to become mentally tougher, to keep you mentally strong every single day, and it’s something that has helped give me that extra inch that has maybe drove me forward in the last four or five years,” he reasons.
“I’m a firm believer of when you’re maybe down in your confidence, why go [see the psychologist] then? When you’re high in confidence, why not go then to keep yourself mentally stronger when things are going well?
“I do it a lot and it’s something I like, I feel it’s helped my game over the last few years. I feel the last few years have been on the up and I want to continue that heading into next year. Over the next four or five years I feel they’re going to be the best years of my career. I really do feel I’m coming into the best years of my career.”
The Premier League offers a new challenge but before he gets a chance to rest for the summer — not that there will be much with Ora, his three-month old daughter — he is eager to build on his impressive displays for Ireland under Mick McCarthy.
“Mick showed a lot of faith in me and I felt like I repaid him in those games and I want to keep repaying him moving forward. I feel like I’ve got my foot in the door a little bit now.”
Hourihane isn’t the type to let it close now.
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