JAMES CHAMBERS HAS been in America for almost 10 years.
He left the League of Ireland at the end of the 2015 season, when the former St Patrick’s Athletic midfielder had just been named by his peers in the Professional Footballers’ Association of Ireland Premier Division team of the year.
He was 28 and ready to leave Dublin for good.
A decade on life has changed in the USA, but that doesn’t mean Chambers has. “I just feel a little bit more like I understand myself better,” he says.
“Ultimately, I figured out what, and who, I am, and how I want to do things. What values do you have? What do you really, truly believe in? What do you care for? What do you not want to waste any fucking time on? What do you want to put your effort and energy into?”
That openness, an acceptance of vulnerability and introspection, has felt like a cornerstone of his life.
He was candid previously about his mother Hilda’s death a week before Christmas when he was only 17. She suffered a heart attack in bed while Chambers and his two younger siblings – twins Laura and Stephen – also slept.
John, their father, remained a constant, reassuring and protective presence until he also suffered a cardiac arrest while at Mass near the family home in north Dublin.
Chambers was two years into his new life in America but returned to be by his father’s bedside for 10 days before he passed. “He gave me the trust and belief to do what I am doing here,” Chambers says. “Having his faith to go and pursue things here, it’s a comfort.”
In his first year as a head coach of Colorado Springs Switchbacks last season, the 38-year-old guided the club to their first USL Championship.
“I still made so many mistakes and am learning all of the time. A lot went right for us and the players were brilliant,” he says.
“I know I’m intense and sometimes over the top but I’m true to who I am, and I think the guys can see that I am genuine and can feel like they can connect and associate with that. Players are the smartest people in the world assessing people, they’ll know if you’re spoofing.”
A chance meeting with legendary boxing coach Billy Walsh at a Colorado Rapids game two years ago has played a part in shaping his outlook. In his role as head coach of USA Boxing, Walsh is based in Colorado Springs and has become a mentor and confidante for Chambers as well as the other Irish members of staff – sporting director Stephen Hogan is from Malahide and technical director Alan McCann completes a hat-trick of Dubs.
Walsh took part in his first official engagement for the club this week when he led part of a pre-season training session. “Just an incredible person and coach,” Chambers says of the former head of the Irish High Performance Boxing Programme.
Major League Soccer (MLS) may theoretically only be one rung above ob the ladder, but it’s a world away given San Diego FC agreed to pay a record $500 million fee to join as part of the last expansion in 2023.
Switchbacks Extend Technical Staff Contracts for 2025!!
— Switchbacks FC (@SwitchbacksFC) February 7, 2025
Read full article here: https://t.co/3ntq9Gxq8Q#switchbacksfc pic.twitter.com/51bumdIJjQ
Chambers talks to The 42 from his office inside the 8,000-capacity Weidner Field Stadium in downtown Colorado Springs. The Rockies are two hours north, but the plan was never to venture this far west once he landed Stateside.
“When I first came it was only for the football. Then I met my girlfriend, my fiancée, my wife,” he says, making sure to clarify something important through a fit of laughter.
“They’re not three different women. It’s the same one.”
Chambers got engaged to Ali just before the Covid-19 pandemic made them push out wedding plans. Their life in Philadelphia seemed settled, but football will always find a way to test resolve.
Chambers was coaching kids aged nine to 11 in the Philadelphia Union academy as his playing career wound down with affiliate club Bethlehem Steel in the USL.
“I had been uncomfortable for a long time doing it because I felt I couldn’t give the kids everything they needed from a coach, but I knew I wanted to pursue it and felt like it was time to get past those feelings of being uncomfortable. I had to actually get better.
“You get tested all the time in life with different challenges. I think it’s OK to accept that you’re not going to rise to every challenge at the very beginning and nail it. It’s OK to take longer to get going with it. That’s how I feel with coaching.”
Great session with USA Boxing Head Coach Billy Walsh 🥊#switchbacksfc pic.twitter.com/0b2qJb0cRC
— Switchbacks FC (@SwitchbacksFC) February 28, 2025
He has his A Licence and the aim is to have the Pro by the time he’s 40. Sporting director Hogan also worked in Philadelphia with Chambers and offered him the chance to move to Colorado with former head coach Brendan Burke in 2021.
“I’m far from elite, I know that,” Chambers says ahead of the start of the USL season away to El Paso in Texas next weekend. “But I’m working every single day to be the best I can. I can talk to my brother and sister and they are able to tell me they’re proud of me.
“My wife is able to do the same, but my mother and father are not here anymore so I want to make it as clear as day that they could only be proud of me. That pushes me every single day.
“That’s my ‘deep why?’, my parents. They shaped and reared me and now I want to be able to make my wife and my family happy. It’s cheesy and corny but it’s a simple thing to want to better yourself and be able to help the people around you. If you can do that then you’re not too far wrong as a person.”
Great piece David. I like these type of articles of Irish people playing, coaching in leagues you mightn’t associate Irish people with