WHEN ASKED ABOUT sporting role models, Andrew Omobamidele barely misses a beat.
“Virgil van Dijk,” he says, citing the accomplished Liverpool centre-back and recently-crowned PFA Player of the Year.
Omobamidele speaks about the Dutch international with a mixture of confidence and realism. The youngster is confident enough to realise he is nowhere near the Dutchman’s level currently, while possessing enough self-belief to at least strive towards emulating the 27-year-old star.
“I play centre-back and Virgil van Dijk is obviously the best defender at the moment. He’s quality. He’s one of my idols in my position. I play for Norwich City in England and we like to play out from the back so being good on the ball is kind of part of that.
“That’s why I look up to him. Some of his attributes, I like to think I have some of them myself. Obviously, he’s on a different level, but he’s a good person to look up to and a good role model.”
The 16-year-old is preparing for the U17 Euros where he hopes to help hosts Ireland live up to high expectations, with the Boys in Green having reached the quarter-finals in the competition for the past two consecutive tournaments.
Playing in front of a partisan home crowd with friends and family in attendance will be a big test for this young Irish group, but Omobamidele insists he is accustomed to such pressure. In his short career so far, he has already come up against Dutch international Vincent Janssen — a striker eight years his senior.
“At the start of the season, I was playing regularly at 18s and I’d started every game, so my progress was good. My debut for the 23s was against Nottingham Forest and I played the full 90, and then I played against Southampton 23s. Hopefully, next year, I’ll be able to get in fully with the 23s in my second season.
18s is totally different to 16s and then it’s another big step to 23s. It’s more physical. You’re playing against pros. Sometimes first-team players step back and drop down and play U23. We played Tottenham and [Vincent] Janssen, players like that, are coming down to play. This was a couple of months ago when he wasn’t getting his game for the first team. It’s a good test. Where else would you want to be playing? I think I just managed [to cope with Janssen].”
Such feats represent swift progress for Omobamidele in a relatively short space of time. The young footballer was born in Dublin to a Nigerian father and Cork-born mother, growing up in Lucan before moving to Leixlip around the age of 12.
He has two older sisters and two younger brothers, who play football and rugby respectively, while his mother’s side of the family have more of a GAA than a footballing background.
Omobamidele started out as a striker with Leixlip before gradually moving back to midfield and then defence, helping the club reach the All-Ireland finals ultimately.
“It was the All-Irelands that got [me my move away]. Leixlip were a big club at the time but we weren’t compared to the Kevin’s and the Joey’s. Making it to the All-Ireland finals and winning it was a big step forward for us.
“Our goalkeeper, Harry Halwax, went to Derby, our winger went to United, Josh [Giurgi] is obviously at Norwich. I think we’re the team with the most players that actually went over to England. I put it down to the All-Irelands.
“I went last June, so nearly a year ago. The first few weeks were a bit challenging, because I’m used to a big family at home. Going into a house where it’s just me and Josh and the houseparents, no kids, it’s just getting used to it. Now, I’m used to playing every day.
“They’ve a good link with Irish players. Even the coaches, there’s a good few Irish coaches there, so it’s a good club to be at.
“Because some of us are Irish, we take care of our own, maybe go out to Nando’s or something like that, for something to do after training and games.”
Omobamidele and his fellow youth team are generally encouraged to attend the Norwich senior side’s home games, though his plane flight to Ireland coincided with their promotion-sealing win on Saturday.
Unfortunately, I couldn’t go to the game on Saturday, because I was flying here. I was on the plane trying to work the livescore, but I couldn’t get a signal. Then, when I got off the plane, I saw it and it was crazy. It’s going to be good to watch Chelsea and all play at Carrow Road.”
The youngster is hoping to achieve similar success with Ireland in the coming weeks, as he aims to end an encouraging season on a high, while already planning to build on his impressive progress next season.
“In pre-season [at Norwich], it took me a couple of weeks [to catch up], because I was only training Tuesdays and Thursdays with Leixlip. Going into a full training programme from Monday to Friday and a game on Saturday, I think I’ve improved a lot. I wasn’t playing U23s at the start, but in the second half of the season, I’ve been almost every game on the bench and I’ve played two full games already.”
Gavan Casey and Murray Kinsella are joined by Andy Dunne to get stuck into last weekend’s Champions Cup semi-finals.:
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Great move for Arnold who’ll be coming out of his 3 year contract with Brive at only 28.
Hopefully he can build up an impressive reputation and shine for a wayward Brive side similarly to Farrell in Grenoble.
The first of many players across the four provinces who will be making this call in the coming months. With the fewer games in the URC and none in international windows game time has got more and more precious. Connacht are well served at centre with Aki, Daly, Farrell, Robb, and Bolton remaining. Other Irish players I could see similarly on their way to pastures new include Gallagher, any one or two of Healy, Crowley, and Flannery and Loughman at Munster and Ed Byrne, Josh Murphy, Penny, and the two O’Brien’s at Leinster.
@David Finn: i wouldnt include Robb here…hes never fit to play. I cant see Connacht holding on to him to be honest
@David Finn: ….you may not have all the names exactly right but your point is well made. Revive the 5th Province Meath, base it in Navan and develope the facilities to match in what is already a very progressive and ambitious club with a proven track record of growing the game to cater for diversity and an impressive record of progress on the field.
@Michael Murray: There is no need for another province what we need in Ireland is a draft system from schools rugby so players go where they are needed most. No use in IRFU shelling out money to keep 8 top class Irish back rows at leinster and then other provinces having to shell out big money for NIQ back rows makes no sense at all. Worst performing province gets first pick of the talent pool each year. We should also move the provincial schools tournament to a national level.
@Punts & Race Discussion: this is an interesting idea, but Leinster can only signup x amount of players each year to academy contracts.
There are still dozens of players who leave school in Leinster who aren’t signed by Leinster but aren’t picked up by other provinces at this early stage.
Also because of the amount of positions, it would take years before a drafts benefits would kick in.
And Leinster only add 4 or 5 players into the academy each year. So that’s 1 round of picks between the 4 provinces. Either way it still means theres talent coming out of schools in Leinster that provinces are ignoring currently.
@Billy Keenan: Leinster sign them to the sub academy so they stay and play their club rugby in Leinster rather than chance a trip to another province
@john joe brady: yeah that’s a good point and there was an article in the indo a few years ago saying something like 20 players were involved in sub academy.
But surely you’d have to say that an Academy contract would outweigh a sub academy one ?
Think Connachts of Illo from the U20s would be an interesting case study. ATightehad (not a position of typical leinster depth with salanoa, angier bent and McGrath leaving recently) who played underage rugby with Leinster. Could be good to dive deeper into what went on there and how he was brought west, a great talent.
@Billy Keenan: and Leinster took on 7 into the academy this year, which in fairness is much more than the 4 I said they did earlier ^^
@Punts & Race Discussion: absolutely no sense in changing Schools comp to national level. For a start you could have Bandon Grammar/PBC/CBC Cork/Newtown Grammar playing up the top of the country. The local rivalries are what drives the Schools Cups, and kids spending hours sitting on coaches to and from games against Schools they have no inbuilt rivalry with will detract from their enjoyment..
Also Connacht, (Garbally apart) doesn’t have schools where Rugby is the main (or only) Sport with male enrollments big enough to compete with other provinces. There are barely a handful of Boys only schools left in the province and fewer against with enrollments near 500 or more…
Anyway the underage Interpro’s pretty do the job pretty well anyway….
@Punts & Race Discussion: so basically force kids to play for teams even if they have no interest in playing for them? Move to a provience where thsy have no connections?
So say a lad from west cork was picked by ulster and said no i dont want to go there do se ban him from playing for his local club?