O'Donoghue hopes mind guru Currid will be part of new Munster era

Performance psychologist has made major impact on Reds squad who hope she will be part of new supremo Graham Rowntree's set-up

In the thick of it: Munster back-rower Jack O’Donoghue feels he is in the right headspace to build on his good form. Picture: INPHO/Ryan Byrne

Whatever about the identity of Munster’s assistant coaches when the Graham Rowntree era gets underway this summer, it seems the expertise of performance psychologist Caroline Currid will continue to be in demand in the province’s brave new world.

Jack O’Donoghue was the latest squad member to sing Currid’s praises, echoing the rave reviews of senior team-mates such as Dave Kilcoyne who feel they have benefitted from time spent with the Sligo native since Johann van Graan brought her onto to the backroom staff on a consultancy basis last summer.

Back-rower O’Donoghue, who captained Munster in a European game for the first time at Exeter Chiefs last Saturday, was an early adopter of the Currid methodology that has previously served the All-Ireland winning squads of the Tyrone (2008) and Dublin (2011) footballers as well as the Tipperary hurlers (2010) before helping Limerick bag the Liam MacCarthy Cup three times in four years.

And as he welcomed the appointment of forwards coach Rowntree to succeed van Graan as head coach on a two-year contract starting on July 1, the Waterford man also credited Currid for igniting his bid to take his personal form to the new heights he has been achieving of late.

“I feel like maybe it’s not just this season,” O’Donoghue said. “I go back to last season and I was chipping away, chipping away but there were certain aspects of my game that I really needed to fine-tune and I think during the pre-season I certainly did that.

“Caroline coming in is a massive help to talk about the mental side of the game and when things are maybe going badly in a game and how you can swing that around to a positive. But I just hit good form and we just seem to build on which game we go into so I can’t exactly put my finger on it.

“But I’ve just been working hard in the off-season and pre-season. It was going to be a big season. There’s obviously disappointment from last season that spurs you on and motivates you and I just found a good motivation this season for what I need to do to kick on.” 

All in the mind: Performance psychologist Caroline Currid raises the Liam MacCarthy Cup after helping Limerick to another All-Ireland. Picture: Stephen McCarthy/Sportsfile

O’Donoghue, 28, said the reason for his increase in performance levels are “one hundred per cent mental”.

“It is a huge part of the game now … that mental side of the game and it's something that probably I hadn't really tapped into much as I look back on my career. It's certainly something that I think is very beneficial to younger players coming through because you see yourself on a nice steady rise, and then maybe you might plateau at a certain stage in your career.

“For me, that could have been my (2018 knee ligament) injury, and then trying to kick on again and reach the heights that maybe you had before your injury and, you know, it's something that I probably hadn't tapped into, until the pre-season just got gone.” 

Rowntree’s man-management acumen since arriving as forwards coach in late 2019 has also impressed O’Donoghue, to the point where even the “kick up the hole” the Englishman delivered, and caught on a BT Sport camera if not by a microphone, to the Munster team at Sandy Park last Saturday following a poor opening first half of their Heineken Champions Cup Round of 16 first leg was taken on the chin by players willing to listen and learn from their mistakes.

Rowntree, the flanker said, is “very passionate”.

“I think you saw that from that little two-second clip. He’s incredibly passionate about the game, about the scrums, about the breakdown, about the nitty-gritty stuff. Yeah, he gave us a bit of a kick up the hole but the messages after that were really calm and composed. While that’s something you saw in that little snippet from after that the messaging and stuff we were very calm and composed, and we knew exactly what we needed to change and what we needed to do when we out there.

“Graham is an incredible character to have around the place. He’s well able to identify when you’re maybe a bit down and knows exactly how top pick a player up and to motivate a player. Certainly around selection and maybe they’re having a tough time with form and stuff, he’s a good man to put an arm around a player and bring him along.

"I think that’s just the vibe around the place and I think that’s why players do speak so highly of him.” 

Yet while Munster have appointed a man who has already earned the respect of the players after three years in charge of the forwards, O’Donoghue is as curious as anyone else to discover what Rowntree the first-time head coach will be like.

“I actually haven’t a clue. It’s a new role for him. I don’t know will he change. I’m sure he’ll still adopt that looking after players and putting an arm around them. It’s something he’s really good at but, look, I actually haven‘t a clue but it’s quite exciting to see where it might go and how he might adapt to that new role. I think it will be interesting.”