Vikki Wall’s Olympic challenge of starting from scratch at the top tier of a third sport

“I think there definitely are times I get deflated and downhearted,” says Vikki Wall, the newest recruit into the Irish Women’s Sevens development squad. We are talking about the past year and the year to come. And how the two-time All-Ireland medal winner and Aussie Rules convert might find her place at the elite end of her third sport.

“I wouldn’t say I’m walking away delighted,” she says of how she feels at the end of some training sessions with the squad.

“There’s some training sessions where I get more annoyed with myself if it’s things that I can control, in terms of if my handling’s off or if I’m not catching balls, things like that. Because that’s a basic skill that’s transferable across all the sports. That’s not something that I am learning for the first time.

“Whereas even some days you think about some of the set pieces and then maybe things might change, but you have to be able to adapt. But if I’m not able to do those things straight away there are definitely some days I’d be driving home and I just wouldn’t even have the radio playing. I would just be talking to myself almost the whole time.”

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Having excelled in GAA from club to county levels and transferred those skills to AFLW, Australia’s national football league for women, starting from scratch comes as something of a culture shock to Wall.

“It’s definitely outside your comfort zone,” she says. “You’re so reliant in football on being able to play on good instinct and make decisions straight away and that type of thing.

“Even in AFL it took a while to be comfortable to make a decision quickly. And then with sevens, I don’t think I’m there yet. As in, just even trying to wrap my head around a lot of things. It’s definitely a contrast from being able to just rely on, I suppose, things you’ve been doing for years.”

Wall was part of the Meath squad who won two All-Irelands on the bounce, to everyone’s surprise but their own. That doesn’t happen without solid self-belief and an ability to dig deep in challenging circumstances.

“On the pitch, if something goes wrong I don’t know if I have as much self-talk in that moment,” says Wall. “You’re just trying to think of the next thing and the next. If I stayed talking to myself, I’d end up missing the next ruck or missing things like that. So it’s kind of a balance of not being too hard on yourself.”

When the Ireland women’s sevens team qualified in May for the Paris 2024 Olympics – their first time to do so – the ongoing background conversations prompted Wall to ask questions.

“Am I in a position to make an impact? Am I going to go in and be able to actually do well? My dad would be someone I’d always talk about things to and he’s quite blunt. And he was like, ‘Whatever you do, make a decision but just make sure you’re good at it.’ So I’m still trying to get there.”

“There” is getting to a performance level she’s happy with. “There” is also the World Series events in Cape Town, Perth, Vancouver, Los Angeles, Hong Kong, Singapore and Madrid, where she will be striving to compete alongside the likes of Amee-Leigh Murphy Crowe and Lucy Mulhall before the Olympics.

“There’s going to be low points to it and, coming into a team of girls that are well established, that have qualified for an Olympics and have played the sport a lot longer than I have, you have to be very respectful and aware of that,” says Wall.

“But, also, I then have to come back into my own head and say, ‘Okay, I have been asked in here, there’s obviously people in here that think I can do something.’ And the days where maybe I don’t think that, I’m going to have to reframe my mind and look at it from a different perspective. I think it is easy some days when things aren’t going well and you’re kind of feeling a little low, to revert back to, ‘What am I doing here?’”

Some of that answer is to get better. Wall is already an athlete, clearly has potential and, crucially, is driven to improve, both as an individual and also as a team player.

“It’s just an inherent motivation to not want to be bad at something. As in, it’s just to want to be better than people. I look around at training and if someone’s better it means something. You have to be vulnerable, to be like, ‘Right, I’m actually not good at that. How do I get better?’

“You go ask a person that’s best at it. Even in the gym, something as simple as seeing someone else do the same exercise as you with maybe a heavier weight, and thinking, ‘Why am I just doing it this way when you’re capable of doing it at a heavier weight?’

“Being able to play sport and that feeling that sport gives me has always been a massive outlet for me in terms of how I cope with everything else in my life. So I think that that definitely motivates me as well. And the feeling of being part of a team, it’s almost like a higher power, being able to contribute in any way. It’s pretty motivating.”

Looking forward, 2024 could be incredibly significant for Wall. This time next year, what does she hope to have achieved?

“Looking back, obviously in a dream world you’re looking at having been to an Olympics. But from my own perspective, if I was to be able to look back this time next year and have that feeling that I actually gave my all. And it obviously sounds so clichéd, but that I left no stone unturned. If I could say that, I’d be pretty content.”

This time last year Wall’s wildest dreams couldn’t have placed her where she is now. Six months out from potentially playing in an Olympics in her first year in rugby sevens. The ambition, determination and guts it takes to even get to this place of training to be here tells a bigger tale too. Whether or not she makes it to Paris, it’s clear that her remarkable sporting story is far from over.

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