Rugby

Hugo Keenan eyes Paris 2024 as Rugby Sevens look towards Olympic medal

The Irish men’s squad that finished the season in second place in the SVNS rugby series has an eye on the podium in France

Hugo Keenan playing South Africa in HSBC World Rugby Sevens, Civitas Metropolitano Stadium, Madrid, Spain. Photograph: Martin Seras Lima/Inpho

Johnny Watterson
Wed Jun 19 2024 - 06:00

It was natural that much of the focus on Ireland’s men’s and women’s Rugby Sevens Olympic squads would fall on World Cup fullback Hugo Keenan. Straddling both games has drawn interest that would not have been there previously.

The men’s team also qualified for Tokyo three years ago through the repechage, but at that time Keenan was still cementing his place in Andy Farrell’s squad. Then, Olympic rugby was not a priority aim.

So, as Sevens rugby trails the longer version of the game in popularity and profile, a medal this summer in Paris would go some distance towards establishing parity, although probably not entirely.

One thing is clear, the Irish men’s squad that finished the season in second place in the SVNS rugby series has an eye on the podium in France. Arriving at the group coach James Topping believes is best to achieve that victory wasn’t an easy task.

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Two players came back, Andrew Smith and Keenan, meaning two that had regularly played didn’t make the final squad.

Selection is a brutal process but as coach and former Irish winger Topping sees it, everyone is equally entitled to aspire to playing and winning an Olympic medal. Just because Keenan is an outstanding fullback should not exclude him from aspiring to be an Olympic Sevens player too.

Smith, who played a season with Connacht, was the other player who returned to the final squad for a crack at the five-ring dream.

“So, those two guys. Hugo played and got us on the World Series and Andrew Smith played last year to get us qualified in Krakow. So those two guys came pretty firmly and said, ‘Yeah, I’d like to give this a go’,” said Topping.

“Probably my biggest worry was would it disrupt the team dynamic? Would there be a bit of pushback from players? I had no doubt around the attitude and the competence of those two players, but my concern was there had been guys going well this year, we’d made every quarter-final past that in the World Series and got lots of medals this year, no golds unfortunately.

“So, there was that thought of ‘will there be push back from a lot of players?’ There wasn’t, which is one thing. And then there is the thought that listen, if an international player like Hugo Keenan comes up to you and says, ‘I’ll give this a go’ it’s very hard for me to say ‘No, I don’t want to give you a chance of going to the Olympics’.

“So, the players are saying ‘Listen, we can’t stop guys from having a crack at the Olympics’ because they’ve all had a crack at the Olympics as well.”

Irish Rugby Women's Seven’s Squad Training, IRFU High Performance Centre, Blanchardstown, Dublin 18/6/2024 Vikki Wall Mandatory Credit ©INPHO/Laszlo Geczo

Suttonians player Seán Cribbin, who plays in Keenan’s position, is one of the players not included and UCD’s Bryan Mollen the other. But both have been listed as travelling reserves.

“I asked them beforehand when the squad was selected, how they felt about them coming in, and they just said ‘it’s a real challenge’, and that’s the way they looked at it,” said Topping.

“Once they saw Hugo playing and saw what he can do. For someone who literally came off the plane having played in a European Cup and hopped on a six o’clock flight the following morning, it shows the commitment that he’s put in.”

The experience of Keenan and Smith contrasted with that of Vikki Wall, who did not get into coach Allan Temple-Jones’s final squad, captained by Lucy Rock.

Wall came in from Australian Rules football via the GAA, having never played rugby before. She made her debut for Ireland at the HSBC World Rugby Sevens Series in Perth in January.

In a much-heralded switch, Wall, an All-Ireland winner and Footballer of the Year with Meath and AFL payer with North Melbourne, only moved to the oval ball game last September in a bid to make it to Paris. Temple-Jones, however, believes, that while she did not succeed this time, Wall’s future with the Irish squad has not come to an end.

“Yeah absolutely. We’ve already had conversations with Vikki around that,” he said. “She may have certain obligations to fulfil in certain places, but absolutely, we definitely want to get her back in and see where this can go. She’s an amazing athlete, she has a very high ceiling from an athletic performance perspective. She’s really done well and she’s really close.

“She’s been a credit to herself. She’s really got stuck in and got involved. She’s got some exposure around the World Series. There were a lot of girls that were disappointed. She’s one of them. Yes, she was close but she may still get there. Who knows? Players outside of the 12 may still get there.”

The experiment was seen as a long shot even before Wall made the move. Her disappointment, like that in the men’s squad, a counterpoint to the upbeat selection of Cooke’s Ashleigh Orchard. Orchard’s inspiring return to elite rugby and the green jersey continued as she earned Olympic selection just 12 months after giving birth to her daughter Arabella.

Men’s squad: Niall Comerford, Jordan Conroy, Hugo Keenan, Jack Kelly, Terry Kennedy, Hugo Lennox, Harry McNulty, Gavin Mullin, Chay Mullins, Mark Roche, Andrew Smith, Zac Ward. Travelling reserves: Bryan Mollen, Seán Cribbin.

Women’s squad: Kathy Baker, Megan Burns, Amee-Leigh Murphy Crowe, Alanna Fitzpatrick, Stacey Flood, Eve Higgins, Erin King, Vicky Elmes Kinlan, Emily Lane, Ashleigh Orchard, Béibhinn Parsons, Lucy Rock. Travelling Reserves: Claire Boles, Amy Larn.

Johnny Watterson

Johnny Watterson

Johnny Watterson is a sports writer with The Irish Times

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