Jermyn ready for battle
The answer, more often than not, is a whole load of very little. At a time when the majority of the Irish squad are dotted around Europe, playing professionally and tweeting sweet nothings in their ample time off, you imagine Jermyn comes in after a long day of work as a solicitor with Ronan Daly Jermyn in Cork City, loosens the tie a little and tries to contain his envy.
“You see with their tweets what they’re up to — they’re doing nothing, and loving it!” says Jermyn, who at 29, and with 132 caps, is one of the squad’s elder statesmen.
“There’s quite a few clubs where there’s a group of buddies at it, like Mikey Watt and Geoff McCabe at Santander in Spain. There are times when you’d like to be doing that this year, especially when you finish up training on Sunday in Dublin and you’re going into work Monday.”
The Cork Church of Ireland midfielder has already served time in the Dutch league in the 2007/08 season, just before recession and renewed self-belief sent a slew of Irishmen to play in Europe’s best leagues. Alongside Iain Lewers and Eugene Magee, international team-mates past and present respectively, he spent a year at HGC in The Hague, coming within a whisker of winning a EuroHockey League title.
“I was delighted to tick it off the list and it improved me, playing against the best players week-in, week-out. But I found it kind of boring. Over here I’ve a great bunch of friends, I love golfing and I’ve loads of different stuff I do outside hockey. I always have to be doing something.”
Jermyn nonetheless admits he hasn’t had much time to pursue other interests recently — not with Ireland facing into the FIH Road to London 2012, an Olympic qualifier on home turf at UCD, beginning today against Russia.
As well as being one of the few in the squad holding down a day job, he also contended with a race against time to play after suffering a fractured ankle in training last October. He was named in Paul Revington’s squad but had to come through three friendlies against the Czech Republic last weekend to prove his fitness.
“The doctor was happy with the fracture straight away, but I did ligaments as well and they take an awfully long time to heal. Others who have done it appreciate how long it’s taken.
“There was definitely a time, after about two and a half months of being out, where I thought ‘I might not make this’, but that just motivated me more. I worked very hard and was disciplined enough.”
That sort of discipline and professionalism is the minimum requirement for Irish coach Revington. The South African has built on the foundations laid by predecessor David Passmore, producing a consistency of results and performances that leaves Ireland feeling confident they can overcome their third seeding at this qualifier and take the sole Olympic qualification berth on offer.
“He’d be a bit of a taskmaster,” admits Jermyn. “His professionalism is second to none. He thinks about hockey 24/7, he’s an excellent coach, you can’t fault him.”
Revington’s record speaks for itself; three trophies were annexed last summer — the INSEP Five Nations, where Ireland were the lowest ranked side, the Champions Challenge II and the Celtic Cup — while 16th-ranked Ireland also toppled three of the world’s top 11 and matched their best ever finish of fifth at the European championships.
Success hasn’t come without sacrifice. The Irish men have fundraised to prop up their own programme, including a novel idea where they played seven Dublin club sides in one day, cycling from venue to venue. Against that backdrop, the news late in 2011 that the Irish Hockey Association were granted hosting rights to the qualifier was music to everyone’s ears.
Ireland haven’t qualified a hockey team for an Olympics since 1908 — or a team in any sport for half a century.
You don’t need a marketing degree to know that having the only direct Olympic qualifier in any discipline take place here represents a huge promotional opportunity, particularly for a sport that has only a couple of thousand adult male players in Ireland.
“We’re just delighted the tournament’s at home, and we’re hearing the ticket sales are pretty good. In the tougher times in the games, hopefully they’ll [the crowd] pull us through those,” says Jermyn.
“Back in the day, you’d be thinking ‘Oh, a nice trip to Japan’ but now it’s just so professional and focused, we just want anything that gives us a better chance to qualify. We’re training on that pitch every week.”
Jermyn would love to see Irish hockey emulate the success of cricket but knows the talking must be done on the pitch first. While he doesn’t always figure in Revington’s starting XI these days, the drag-flicking expert is still Ireland’s number one set-piece specialist and last summer was labelled “world class” by Dutch coach Paul Van Ass.
His 71 international goals have him eight short of Stephen Butler’s record tally, prompting the Belgium-based former Glenanne man to joke on Twitter that he should have put a sniper in the stand at last year’s European championships in Germany.
Butler reckons he “couldn’t think of a nicer guy or better player to break the record” though Jermyn says he isn’t motivated by personal landmarks. But could this be his last hurrah in a green shirt? He says he hasn’t given retirement much consideration.
“No, I’m mostly just focusing on trying to get to the Olympics. But I’m nearly 30, so put it this way, I won’t be at the next Olympics. I haven’t thought about the next World Cup but major competitions are what I want to play in. That’s an ambition of mine.
“Afterwards, who knows?”
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