Coffee with Owen Farrell: How Jonny Cooper keeps looking for an edge

Six-in-a-row star Jonny Cooper is on a personal quest to ‘be unrivalled’. Photo by Piaras Ó Mídheach/Sportsfile

Jonny Cooper has described winning with Dublin and improving each year as “an addiction” that he’s constantly feeding.

The six-in-a-row star, and seven-time All-Ireland winner, is on a personal quest to ‘be unrivalled’ and has tapped into some serious sporting minds for information and inspiration. One of those is England rugby captain Owen Farrell whom Cooper chatted with for a couple of hours while visiting the Saracens club.

That was after Dublin’s All-Ireland win in 2018 and defender Cooper didn’t regret the personally funded trip to the UK.

Speaking to The Sideline Live podcast regarding high performance, Cooper said: “I flew over to London, took a taxi up to their grounds, watched their session and next thing I know I’m in a cafe 20 minutes down the road with Owen Farrell for an hour and a half, two hours, talking about all sorts of different things.

“That type of thing, that the captain of England at 25 or 26 — and he’s obviously done lots since then — for me, he’s a massive role model and you obviously get a bounce from that.

“It’s not that I didn’t believe I had something to offer but I was going there thinking, ‘What can I pull in to me, to help my team-mates?’ Whereas I guess he had the kind of the same thing in mind and I’m not surprised given his level of performance.”

The 31-year-old has also visited professional rugby outfits in Ireland, as well as AFL teams, but never divulged any of the Dubs’ secrets.

“Yeah, they were disappointed and it was a very short conversation, they were. I had to deflect on that!”

The Na Fianna man is committed for another season with Dublin and will continue to chase perfection.

“Dublin has been successful but at the same time there’s been very small and fine margins in some of those cases so I would say there’s a bit of luck,” he said. “And the more you win the more it becomes a bit of a habit. And if you like, it’s a bit of an addiction, for want of a better word.”

The full interview with Jonny Cooper on The Sideline Live podcast can be accessed here: