Irish skipper Sean reckons broken heart now mended
SEAN MURRAY hailed Ireland’s hockey heroes after they held on in dramatic fashion to book their place at the Paris Olympics.
Skipper Murray was among the survivors from the heartbreaking failure four years ago to make it to the Tokyo Games, when Canada scored late in Vancouver to give themselves a lifeline before winning on penalties.
This time Ireland held on in their win or bust third place play-off clash with Korea in Valencia, their joy in sharp contrast to the devastation felt by the women’s team on Saturday – their 2-1 loss to Great Britain ended their hopes of qualification.
This is the third time the men’s team has made it to the Olympics and Murray was overjoyed afterwards.
“I’m just lost for words,” he said. “Credit to Korea, they came out and it was a horribly, horribly tough game. “I’ve been on the other side of that before in a match where we’ve lost for the Olympic Games and now I get to feel – and the rest of the lads get to feel – what it’s like to qualify and I can’t put into words how proud I am of the team. Ecstatic.”
Ireland held a two-goal advantage on three occasions in a riveting encounter but couldn’t shake off their opponents.
Matthew Nelson opened the scoring at the end of the first quarter, Ben Johnson doubled the lead in the 18th minute but Kim Junghoo made it 2-1 four minutes later.
Johnny Mckee restored the two-goal lead only for Jeong Junwoo to strike back just before half-time. When Shane O’donoghue made it 4-2 in the 40th minute, Ireland looked safe but Korea came back again, and they held out for the final 16 minutes when Jang Jonghyin pounced.
“We believed in this group,” Murray (inset) said. “It was kind of a rebuild after the last time.
“We have a lot of young guys, guys who haven’t played in Olympic qualifiers before and we knew it was going to be a tough, tough tournament.
“It comes down to the last game and with literally a few seconds to go, Korea could have levelled it up so I’m just so proud of everyone.
“All the hard work the staff and ourselves put in, the sacrifices everyone’s made to be in this position, and now we’re looking forward to the summer.”