Back trusting his instincts again

DENIS HURLEY INTERVIEW: GERRY THORNLEYtalks to the Munster back who, after an injury-interrupted season last year, has re-emerged this season revitalised after Ireland's summer tour to the US

HE HAILS from Kells, Co Meath, and was inducted into the game through Navan RFC. But as the son of the replacement hooker for the Munster heroes that beat the All Blacks in 1978, Denis Hurley has always been a Munster boy at heart. That umbilical link was strengthened by trips to Thomond Park as a supporter with his father.

He’d hear the tales and the compliments from people who knew Gerry Hurley.

“I began getting a bit of an appreciation for what he did achieve even though he wasn’t playing on the day.”

Among the earlier visits to Thomond Park was the dramatic 31-30 win over Saracens courtesy of Keith Wood’s late try and when the younger Hurley completed his Leaving Cert year in St Munchin’s College, he confesses he was one of those who scaled the wall to see the “Miracle Match” against Gloucester in 2003. “We’d won our match that day as well.”

One of the surprising blow-ins into the Heineken Cup winning side of two seasons ago along with Tomás O’Leary, his career has had some undulations since then, before reinventing himself as a winger and re-emerging again.

He started the season strongly, scoring his first two Munster tries in the win over the Scarlets in September, and since returning to the starting line-up away to Perpignan, he began looking the part again, perhaps even more than before.

The line he took for Munster’s third try off Paul Warwick’s long flat pass showed why coach Tony McGahan had plumped for him again this season, and another followed last week.

“I suppose confidence held me back a lot last year. At times I was more frustrated with myself rather than just going out and playing rugby.

“After games when I analysed myself, I’d look at ‘what am I doing?’ when I made these silly errors, and I suppose now I’ve just found myself again, just been doing what I can do and just showing it.”

His father remained a constant springboard. “He had no qualms about telling me what’s what, and Duchie (Jason) Holland, the backs coach here, has always been giving me direction and feeding me information week to week. And he knew I probably was in a bad place.”

Needless to say, rugby has always been a sizeable part of his life, even when growing up in Meath as the son of a Munster player in exile.

“We were always known locally as the rugby Cork family. We were always supporters of Cork in the GAA, especially in 1990 and a few of those years in the ’90s when Cork and Meath had their battles. Even when I was playing a lot of football the lads always knew that rugby was going to be my first choice.”

The third eldest behind Patrick, Gráinne, with a younger sister Emma, he can still remember his first day’s training at Navan RFC with his older brother when five years old, even though the youngest age group was under-eights.

“I was a bit small alright. We’d been brought shopping the week before and I remember we were in tracksuits when everybody else was in shorts. Some good years there. A lot of good memories.”

Switching to St Munchin’s can’t have been easy, though his family pedigree and rugby ability helped. An outhalf until then, he was moved to outside centre.

“It was different rugby from what I was used to.”

His coach at UCC, Gerry Byrne, inspired Hurley to develop a professional mindset, working out in the gym and making himself stronger.

UCC also proved a stepping stone to the Munster Academy from February 2005, before graduating to a development contract in 2007-08.

Declan Kidney’s willingness to do what he believes is the right thing by the team has rarely been better illustrated than in the knock-out stages of that Heineken Cup-winning campaign.

Hurley had only played a half dozen league games before that January but then two impressive performances against Ulster and Connacht persuaded Kidney to retain Hurley for his Euro debut in the quarter-final away to Gloucester.

In his third cup game, he was part of the team that beat Biarritz in Cardiff.

“I was over the moon to get it. I had been asking Deccie would I get a chance again at some stage. I didn’t think it was going to come that year but it was great that it did.”

It seemed his career was about to take off but injury delayed him last season, and with Keith Earls nailing down the fullback slot, thereafter Hurley’s nine starts were all in the league.

A turning point came when Hurley was included in the Irish squad that toured North America and won his first cap against the USA last May as a 69th-minute replacement for Darren Cave, and then was part of Ireland’s Churchill Cup-winning side.

“It was a chance to revitalise myself, and it was away from the whole Munster scene and it was something refreshing. It helped then that the Churchill went so well and we played quality rugby. It gave me confidence that I’m well capable of playing at this level.”

He’s ironed out a few glitches under the high ball and in his positional play while, by the sounds of things, last season he was almost thinking too much about the game and not playing enough on instinct.

“When I was growing up playing rugby, once I got the ball in hand I was just gone with it. There was no thinking about it, I was going to do it.

“Part of that has come back into my game now and it’s given me a bit of an edge, getting me into space and getting me through tackles, and given me a lot of confidence going forward again.”