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After a nightmare 18 months, Jerry Flannery is back raring to go and determined to make an impact at the World Cup. Just prior to the trip Down Under, we caught up with Jerry for a chat about the long road to recovery, his experiences of France 2007 and why Ireland have reason to be more positive about their prospects this time around.

By Conor Heneghan

Amidst all the doom and gloom of the World Cup warm-ups last month, there were a few positives to take if you looked hard enough. The form of Andrew Trimble was one; the ease with which Conor Murray took to the international game was another.

Perhaps the biggest fillip, however, was the return of Jerry Flannery to an Irish jersey some 18 months after his last appearance against France in February 2010, which was, of course, marked by the kung-fu kick on Alexis Pallison that understandably caught the eye of the citing commissioners.

For that offence, Flannery earned a six-week suspension, but could have barely imagined that it would be a year and a half before he’d don an Ireland jersey again. The road back to full fitness has been a long and a hard one and at times, it didn’t look as if there was an end in sight. After all, at 32, Flannery was no spring chicken and the obituaries on his career had already been penned.

He had made a few attempted comebacks and all of them ended disastrously. But he persevered. Flannery went to see doctors at Liverpool and Arsenal and visited an Italian specialist in an effort to sort out his troubled calf, before he eventually travelled to Sweden in March for an operation that seems to have finally laid the problem to rest, touch wood.

Now in New Zealand and looking forward to his second World Cup, everything is sweetness and light for Flannery, but he admits that there were some dark days before his return.

“I think February was probably the lowest, because I didn’t really know where I could go with it from there,” he told JOE prior to his departure to New Zealand.

“I felt I had worked so hard in that period coming up to the Ulster game (last Christmas) and because I hadn’t gotten things right by then, it was as if I had almost gone back to square one by February.

When we came back from that World Cup, we were expecting people to throw tomatoes at us and stuff!

“With the surgery I had at the end of March, it was kind of a case that I needed to see a big physical intervention in this injury and at least when I look at my legs now, I see a big scar in my calf and know that this should have affected change in my situation.

“I have to say [Irish physio] Brian Greene has been brilliant; he’s been incredibly patient and I’ve had great support from Declan Kidney and Tony McGahan as well. I’ve been lucky because I’m a fairly experienced player and I’ve worked with them for a good few years and they understand. They know you a little better and they know when you’re going to be particularly down.”

Comeback

The majority of Irish followers looked on with a degree of fear as Flannery finally returned to action, dreading and almost half-expecting something to go wrong yet again. Thankfully, 20-minute cameos against Scotland and in both games against France went off without a hitch and he was pencilled in to start against England in the final warm-up game.

He did limp off after 50 minutes, but the complaint was only a minor one and if you were to look at his contribution over all four games, you would find it hard to believe that he had been out for so long. His impact has been such, in fact, that there have been calls that he should be re-instated ahead of Rory Best as first choice hooker.

Flannery, however, is just glad to be back feeling fit and like the rest of the squad, seems to be enjoying their first few days in New Zealand. Like many of the current squad, he was present in France four years ago and will be hoping to have more pleasant memories of this tournament that the ones he has of 2007.

Asked to explain what went wrong back then, he is still at a loss:

“I just remember feeling quite bewildered as to why things were going so badly, because we all knew how well we were playing going into the last World Cup and we were so, so confident. We worked really hard, but we probably had neglected the rugby side of it,” he recalls.

“We probably looked at how well we played up until the end of the Six Nations and probably thought that if we can take this squad of players and make them bigger, stronger and faster and keep them healthy, we’re in with a great shout, but it doesn’t work like that. Rugby’s not a bodybuilding competition, obviously you want to get bigger stronger, and faster, but rugby instincts are one of the most important things to have.

Jerry and Donncha O'Callaghan wearing all-too familiar expressions during the 2007 World Cup

“I just think that we were probably a little bit blunt going into it but for the life of me, I don’t think anyone in the squad had put their hand up and said ‘I know a better way to do this’. We all believed we were doing the right thing and when it wasn’t working for us, we were just scratching our heads going ‘why is this going so badly?’. It was really depressing to have given your absolute best at something and to be so far off the standard, you know.

“We were just very grateful to come back to Munster afterwards and we were lucky enough to win the Heineken Cup that year and it was huge for us, especially for the lads that had gone to the World Cup. We came back feeling as low as worms because everyone wants to feel like they do their job reasonably well, but when we came back from that World Cup, we were expecting people to throw tomatoes at us and stuff!”