There’s something about Aussie.
With a 35″ stick in hand and a sliotar in close proximity, Austin Gleeson can do whatever the hell he wants.
With a flick of those Rolex wrists, he can make a ball talk. With an instinctive thought, he can execute perfection. He can send a whole crowd crazy. He can leave an opponent mystified. He can make a watching youngster want to pick up a hurley, he can make them dream about becoming the next Austin Gleeson.
He gets a lot of criticism. More than most hurlers in Ireland, Gleeson, the 2016 Hurler of the Year is intensely under the microscope. He dares to be different. He has the audacity to back himself to attempt something that others wouldn’t dream.
Some Irish people take notion with this attitude. “It doesn’t feed into the ‘keep your head down, be humble, get the job done’ Irish Dream,” wrote Conan Doherty the day after the All-Ireland hurling final.
Treatment of Austin Gleeson is a sad reflection of the worst part of being Irish, writes @ConanDoherty https://t.co/5rr0rLnAZQ #Waterford
— SportsJOE (@SportsJOEdotie) September 4, 2017
The same attitude that produced two of the best individual moments of skill of this summer.
Exhibit A.
Stunning skill from Austin Gleeson for a sensational point. Join us live on @Rteone or highlights later on @TheSundayGame at 9.3pm on @rte2 pic.twitter.com/EFHxNfliE5
— The Sunday Game (@TheSundayGame) June 18, 2017
Exhibit B.
THIS goal helped 'Na Déise' to reach Sunday's #GALvWAT All-Ireland Hurling Final! Look back at Austin Gleeson's superb run/goal vs Cork! pic.twitter.com/VKifYPPUYO
— The GAA (@officialgaa) August 29, 2017
Sometimes they don’t come off for the 22-year-old. He’s had his bad days, and as he readily admits himself, 2017 wasn’t his best year, but that’s who he is, that’s Austin Gleeson. That’s the most skillful player in the country.
What prompts him to believe?
“The belief and the stupidity,” he replies.
Ball manipulation. New tricks. Himself and his Déise teammates are always testing the boundaries.
“Before training, we all just go out 25 minutes before the training session is due to start. There’s always a group of us trying those mad things on one side of the field to see would they come off, and doing these different things with the ball,” says the Mount Sion club man.
“It just comes from that, doing those little things, and then, when they come off, you feel confident enough to do them in a game. A couple of those things came off this year, but there was other things that didn’t.
“It’s all about that practice, and trying those things in training. There’s players that might have been doing things that were ten times better than me, but they just weren’t getting the chances to pull them off,” he added at the Coca-Cola Designated Driver campaign event.
One of his standout attributes is his ability to hit a sideline cut, though he wasn’t best pleased with how they went for him in 2017.
“This year, they weren’t really going for me. I think I practiced them more this year than previous years and I think when I was practicing them and they weren’t going right, I was getting frustrated, and that was coming out in the matches. I was thinking like ‘I’m not going to get this one, and it was always in the back of my head,’ and I suppose that’s probably why,” he reasons.
His routine will stay the same. It’s just about going back to basics.
“I always lay the sliotar down the same way, take the two/three steps back, and then I just go for it. Whatever way I hit the sidelines, they always seem to curl, as a seahook so, I have to take that consideration. Sometimes then, when I hit them straight, they end up about 80 yards wide,” laughed the 22-year-old.
He will be back.
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