THE SHORTLIST FOR RTÉ Sports Person of the Year contains a host of athletes who excelled this year.
Sinéad Farrell discusses why Olympic silver medalist Annalise Murphy is worthy of consideration.
AT THE OLYMPIC Games in 2012, Ireland discovered a new athlete to get behind. In a country where Olympic prizes come in mild waves rather than great tsunamis, we naturally gravitate towards those who emerge as medal contenders as the event progresses.
In the concluding stages of the laser radial dinghy class event four years ago, Irish people found themselves supporting sailor Annalise Murphy. We knew she was from Dublin and little else besides. But she was in a gold medal winning position heading into the final day, that much we were sure of.
Sitting at the summit of the overall leaderboard, we were certain a medal of some colour would be coming back to Ireland. But then came the implosion, and that regression to fourth place, and that devastated interview on the shoreline.
She vowed to come back stronger at the next Olympics and earlier this year, her promise came to fruition. A fifth place finish on the final day earned her a silver medal although she was in gold medal territory at one point.
No matter, she was guaranteed a spot on the podium and vanquished the demons of the previous Games. The fact that she managed to retain her composure for an extra day due to a weather delay demonstrates just how much she has matured since the heartbreak of four years ago.
Interestingly, Murphy confessed in the aftermath of Rio, that she despaired at times before the Rio Games and ironically, felt more confident going to London in 2012.
2016 is the year of her redemption and at just 26 years of age, you get the sense that there’s much more still in the tank.
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