Hockey fanatic Siobhan makes her international debut at 50

Talking Sport with Stephen Glennon

Way back in the 1930s, American psychologist Walter Pitkin wrote his famous self-help book ‘Life Begins at Forty’. Around this same era, Sophie Tucker recorded a song of the same name. However, almost a century on, it would appear, this is no longer the case. At least for one Galway City native.

For Siobhan Glynn (nee O’Donovan), 50 is the new 40 and, no doubt, as she celebrated her milestone birthday last weekend, the current Irish international masters hockey player had to have nurtured a great sense of fulfilment and satisfaction when she reflected back on what she has achieved to date.

Of course, family will have come first – she is married to Loughrea native Brian and they have two sons, Eanna (21) and Darragh (16) – but not far from her thoughts would have been her No. 1 sporting passion, that being hockey.

“All I ever want to do is play hockey,” says Glynn, who recently made her Ireland debut when lining out for the Over 50s at the World Championships in Rotterdam. “To the extent that I have played in every position, except for the goalkeeping position. I will play whatever position as long as it is on the pitch.”

To still be playing at such a decent standard – Glynn also continues to feature for Renmore HC in the local league – underlines the dedication, commitment and love she has for the sport and, in this respect, being capped for her country at international level is just reward for a lifetime of endeavour.

And she is not finished yet. To illustrate this point, she says that every year for the past decade she has been travelling with friends to take part in ‘Golden Oldies’ hockey festivals around the world. “It is fun really and some of the players would be well over 70 and even 80. So, it is a real social thing,” she says.

“I envisaged that Masters was going to be like that but it is completely different. We trained for three hours every Sunday in Dublin. I never had been on a hockey pitch for three hours in my life. Constantly running around. The Over 40s and Over 50s trained together and at the end we would play a match.

“The match used to kill me. I said I’ll never survive playing a match in Holland, but it was the two hours running around before that hurt. The girls were great fun though and we were serious about it. I am never going back to the other (Golden Oldies) hockey now. I’m going to stay at this as long as I can.”

Then again, what Glynn and Ireland achieved at the World Championships was remarkable. They began with a 5-0 victory over tournament debutantes USA before seeing off Wales on a 3-0 scoreline and hosts Holland 2-1 in their next two group games.

For more, read this week’s Galway City Tribune.