Rising Rebel Joyce living the dream

Chris Joyce is following an illustrious band in the number six jersey.

There’ll only be four of them on the terrace this weekend.

Barry, Noel, Philip and Trevor will be one man short for Cork and Clare in the Munster senior hurling championship when they unwrap the sandwiches.

There’s a good reason for the absence, though. The usual fifth member of the group hasn’t emigrated or anything: he’s playing for Cork.

Christopher Joyce explains: “My Dad, Barry, would have brought me to all the Cork matches as a kid. Himself and his pals, and me, the five us all up on the train together since I was about eight years old. I always went to the same place on the terrace too, down by the corner, to watch the game.

“It was always a great experience — walking around the Square in Thurles, taking in the atmosphere.

“Same with Croke Park. We went up to the All-Ireland in 2004 but couldn’t get tickets together, so I ended up on Hill 16 next to this woman from Galway who was giving me soup and sandwiches. Her nephew was playing in the minor game and she looked after me.”

Tomorrow it’s the Gaelic Grounds in Limerick. Clare, the team who’ve beaten Cork three times already this season, are in the other corner.

It’s not Joyce’s first start for Cork — last year he wore the number six jersey against Offaly in the qualifiers.

The beginning was inauspicious...

“Oh yeah, I was blocked down right by the sideline on the covered stand side. Bad start.

“I was thrown in at the deep end but I’d be confident enough. I felt it was my chance: my attitude was that there’s no point in training away all the time if you don’t take your chance when you get it: there’s no point in leaving it after you. I just went out to play each ball as it came and it worked out. It helped to be at home, to be down the Pairc for that one. The Cork crowd got behind me, and I suppose if I’d been blocked down early on up in Tullamore the Offaly crowd mightn’t have been as supportive.

“The one good thing about playing centre-back is you’re involved all the time in the game, and that helps your concentration. You don’t have time to dwell on things.”

He had decent support in his corner that day last summer. Growing up with Na Piarsaigh, there were obvious role models around, and one of them had a word during the Offaly game.

“Look, Seán Óg Ó hAilpín and John Gardiner were my heroes all the way. I wanted to do what they did, obviously.

“They were an influence once I started to get involved with the senior team in Na Piarsaigh. Someone like Seán Óg is very professional in the way he prepares, you’d have to learn from someone like that. John is very good to give advice ahead of big games, to tip you off on what you can expect.

“Last year when I played against Offaly, for instance, John had a word with me at half-time just to settle me down and told me to relax and play away. It’s great to have the lads to learn from.”

Joyce, a technician with Wisetek in Cork (“John Savage, the team leader looks after me well”) is looking forward to tomorrow’s clash. Clare may be favourites but he says the atmosphere is positive in the Rebel camp.

“The mood is good, the spirit is good, there are no cliques or anything like that. Playing against Clare, they’ll have one big advantage in that they’ve got a championship game under their belt, and as the cliche goes, that’s worth a dozen training sessions to them.

“We’ll probably be underdogs because they were so impressive beating Waterford. On our side a lot of lads got game time during the league, which has made it a lot more competitive in terms of fellas winning their place on the team.

“It’s disappointing to be relegated, obviously, but we learned a lot during the league at the same time.”

By the way, if you’re a boxing fan you’ve probably put two and two together already regarding Joyce Sr.

Barry is one of the Joyces who made Sunnyside Boxing Club famous.

“Yeah, my Dad has six All-Irelands in boxing,” says Christopher.

“He’s always slagging me — ‘you’ll have to win a few there to catch up’.

“He and my uncle, Kieran, would be well known in boxing circles, and I’d have been interested enough myself — I had the gloves, the boxing bag, all the gear when I was small.

“But I fell in with the Na Piarsaigh street leagues and went with the hurling instead.

“If I’m after a training session or a hard match or whatever, there’s no sympathy from Dad: ‘For God’s sake, when I was your age I was training three times a day for the European Championships, get up and get on with it’. Just codding around.”

No codding this weekend. The four amigos will miss him on the terrace, but they won’t have to look too far to find him.