JAYSON MOLUMBY IS 20 and the first World Cup he remembers is the 2006 edition in Germany, but football’s ignorant whims have forced him to see the game with a more mature perspective.
In 2017, the Waterford midfielder’s star was rising fast. He played a couple first-team games in the League Cup and was adjacent to more as an occasional Premier League substitute.
He scored a 16-minute hat-trick for the Irish U19s, Shane Duffy hailed him as a future senior international and first-team manager Chris Hughton wasn’t shy with public praise, either.
Then everything stopped.
He injured his knee, and lost more than six months of football. Three days into his return to training, he dislocated the same knee and lost another eight months. Molumby had to have surgery, replacing the ligament failing to hold his knee in place with one from his hamstring.
“There were a lot of emotions”, says Molumby reflecting on his injury exile.
“I felt hard done by, ‘Why me?’ I played the pity game for a long period of time. The U23s staff were always reassuring, saying, ‘What you’ve done for us, that’s never going to change. You’ll always be that player, so nothing is going to change.’
“Still, the feeling that other players can train, improve and get better while you can’t is a tough feeling.
“I had a lot of bad days when I had no motivation to do anything, thinking that nothing is going to work. That I’m fucked, basically.
“That was the thought process in my head.
The club had psychologists and counsellors for me, and they were always checking in on my mindset. I can’t thank them enough. Brighton were great with me, and Chris Hughton too. He kept reassuring me that the club still rated me, and that they’ll help me because ‘we believe in you.’ He’s a really good guy, and I have a lot of respect for him. I learned a lot about myself, that I’m mentally strong. It’s prepared me for what football is. I had this image of football, that it was all easy-going and plain-sailing, but it can be taken away just like that.
“I’ve learned that quite young, and it will probably help me in the long-run.”
Molumby missed 15 months of action in all, and made the first tentative steps of his comeback in an U23s game with Manchester City in February. Stephen Kenny was watching on, and he duly included Molumby in his squad for the U21s’ opening qualifier with Luxembourg in March.
“I played pretty well. When I went into the camp I was thinking that Stephen was bringing me in just to have me around the group, as I was in his future plans.
“I wasn’t expecting to play as I was only just back from injury. Then he grabbed me a few days before the match and asked me, ‘How would you feel about captaining the side?’
“I was shocked. Captaincy wasn’t in my mind – no, it was secretly at the back of my mind – but I was just thinking of coming in and hopefully get some minutes.
“For him to do that, I can’t thank him enough.”
Ireland cruised to a 3-0 win, and when Molumby was replaced by Jamie Lennon 12 minutes from the end, Kenny grabbed him, turned to the stand behind them and roared, “What about that? He was brilliant, wasn’t he?”
Molumby’s awareness of the game’s fragility isn’t diminishing his excitement for the here and now. Since his return from injury, he has signed a new contract with Brighton and gone on loan to Millwall in the Championship.
He’s breaking into the first-team now, and manager Neil Harris was profligate with praise after his League Cup debut against West Brom.
“I am excited, yeah”, says Molumby. “But you’re never really happy as a footballer, you always want to achieve more and more.
“I’m happy at the moment where I’m at but I know I want to go on and do more. I just want to play as many games as I can. Competitive, first-team football is what I’m aiming for. I just want to keep playing and playing.”
He remains at the heart of an Irish team yet to drop a point in Euro qualifying, and was voted the fourth-best player at this summer’s Toulon tournament.
“It’s been unbelievable. The 21s is the thing I most look forward to. I love playing for Ireland, and Stephen has brought us all together. We’re a close group and we’ve adapted well to his style of play.
“We’re all buying into the way he wants to play, which is a good start. Everyone believes in the coaching and management team, and in the way they want us to play and the way they see Irish football. Stephen has tried to bring back the Irish way.
“It means so much to him to coach us and to have the U21 job. He has passed it on to us, that Irish passion. We love it, and on the pitch we are showing how hard we work.”
Ireland have never qualified for a major tournament at U21 level, but their comeback 3-1 win in Sweden earlier this month has left them in a strong position to break that record ahead of the visit of Italy in October.
Ireland fell 1-0 behind in the 19th minute and utterly dominated the game from then, with three deserved goals arriving in the second half.
“We were passing the ball and controlling it, so it was they who were doing all the running”, says Molumby.
“We knew they would tire before us, we were moving them about and we just weren’t clinical enough even though we had a lot of chances and ran the game.
“The team-talk at half-time was just more of the same. It worked well as they couldn’t do that for 90 minutes, I’m not sure many teams can when you don’t have the ball.
“They ended up getting tired, as we were resilient and dominated the game. We got our chances and we took them.”
Mick McCarthy was at the U21s’ previous game, a 1-0 win over Armenia in Tallaght. He has since singled out a trio of Kenny’s players for praise: Troy Parrott, Aaron Connolly…and Jayson Molumby.
“That’s the goal, isn’t it? You want to impress the first-team manager. But we’re not stupid either, we know Mick is only in the job until after the Euros. He needs to get results so we understand it might be hard for young players to get a chance when the stakes are so high.
“We also know Stephen will be the next manager come the end of the summer, so we want to impress and do our best for our country.
“That’s what it is about – doing our best for our country. We’re doing that at the moment and that’s why we are drawing attention.”
Molumby is close friends with Connolly – “He’s a really good guy. He is extremely motivated to prove people wrong and show what a good player he is” – and, like everyone else, has been impressed by Parrott.
“Things are being thrown at him at such a young age, but he is dealing with them. There’s a lot of hype, but there is hype because he is creating it.
“He didn’t start against Sweden after scoring against Armenia, but came off the bench against Sweden and was mentally tough enough to win us the game. Even though he is only 17, Troy and Aaron are probably the two main exciting attacking players, with what they are doing.
“Troy is still so young and at times it’s a little unfair, the pressure he is put under, but he is dealing with it really well and what a player he could be in the future.”
2,500 tickets have already been sold for the 10 October clash with Italy, and the FAI anticipate it will sell out. Having taken ill after the Swedish win and stayed behind in hospital after the squad left, Kenny has since returned home.
Italy’s squad includes Moise Kean of Everton and Roma’s brilliant attacker Nicolo Zaniolo, and remain favourites to qualify. Top spot in the group will guarantee a spot in the competition in 2021, with the group’s runners-up earning a play-off.
Has Molumby given thought to leading Ireland out at the competition?
“Yeah, of course I have. It would be unbelievable. That’s the goal, I think we can do that. I’d be so proud to do that. Italy are coming to Tallaght, and we’re going to make sure they are in for a right game no matter what personnel they bring.
“We’ll give them a good go, we have confidence. No matter who we play, we won’t fear anyone.”
Gavan Casey is joined by Andy Dunne and, from Japan, Murray Kinsella ahead of Ireland’s Rugby World Cup opener against Scotland.
The42 Rugby Weekly / SoundCloud
