Clapham camán - Tom Millerick relishing London challenge

Cork will almost certainly never compete for the Christy Ring Cup, but a Cork native will be lining out in the competition this year.

Having qualified as an accountant last year, Tom Millerick – a brother of Cork panellist Ger – moved to London in November, taking up a job with IMG after a stint with Apple in Hollyhill.

A winner of county IHC (2016), PIHC (2019) and SAHC (2022) medals with Fr O’Neills, he had no immediate plans but in January the London manager, Neil Rogers from Birr in Offaly, got in touch.

“He asked me to come on board,” Millerick says, “I said I’d go out training and see how it was and I really liked it out there.

“It’s a new one – it’s a lot different to home, packing the bag and going ten minutes down the road! London’s obviously huge in terms of size and there are fellas living in all four corners so you could be an hour or more on the tube to training, which I never thought I’d be doing.

“There’s a great culture, the team is going well and Neil has put together a strong enough squad so we’d hope to give it a really good rattle this year.

“It’s a great way to get know people with similar interests as well.”

The family ties to the Ballymacoda/Ladysbridge club are strong – when O’Neills won the senior A, Tom featured along with brothers Joe, Mike, Ger and John. Tom, 28 this year, would have liked to have combined playing for London with still playing for the home club, but the rule didn’t allow for it.

“I was exploring all avenues,” he says, “trying to figure out a way to get both in, but unfortunately it’s no longer doable, which is a pity.

“I’d heard of it being done before, maybe ten years ago, but there’s a new rule now in London that you have to be a member of a club in order to play inter-county.

“It was a tough decision to leave in the first place as your home club is always number one but I suppose it’s the ambition of a lot of people to travel, it’s something that I wanted to do for a while.

“It’s never an easy call to make but to be able to play a high standard of hurling while I’m over here is a massive bonus.”

The UCC finance graduate, who is living in the Clapham/Stockwell area, has joined Robert Emmetts for his club hurling and featured for London in Division 2A of the Allianz Hurling League. They were unlucky to finish fourth of six teams when a top-three finish would have put them in Division 2 of the reconfigured competition for 2025.

Having experienced Premier SHC hurling in Cork, how does it compare with the third tier of the league?#

“I’d say it’s a similar standard,” Millerick. says, “though it’s obviously hard to gauge.

“Particularly against the likes of Tyrone and Derry, you’d expect the athleticism and the fitness and conditioning but they have a lot of very good hurlers as well in their team, which people wouldn’t be that familiar with as they wouldn’t be in the mainstream media or whatever.

“They play a really good style. Derry scored 1-27 off us, which is no mean feat by anyone’s standards. They’re really fit, really fast and they have I suppose what you’d call a football mentality – they use the ball really well.”

The Christy Ring Cup begins the weekend after next, with London facing three of their league opponents – Derry, Tyrone and Wicklow – as well as Kildare, who were in Division 2A of the league, and Sligo, who were in 3A.

Getting the most out of their home games, and hopefully picking up a good result or two away, will be key.

“We’re playing Tyrone in the first round,” Millerick says.

“We played them out in Ruislip three or four weeks ago, it was a really tough battle and we managed to get out the right side of it.

“We’re away to them now in the championship and I suppose away games are a different kettle of fish over here. Either the opposition has to travel to us or we have to go them.

“For us to go to an away game, it’s probably a seven o’clock alarm on a Saturday and then an hour and a half to whichever airport. We generally fly around midday, get to the hotel and do a bit of training.

“You chill out Saturday night and the game is probably at one o’clock on the Sunday, so it’s a long 24 hours, but it’s brilliant as well. You get to travel with a group of players back home to play a game.

“In the league, we played five games – we won our two home games and lost our three away games, which is probably not a coincidence. It’s quite difficult on both sides – people coming over here find it difficult to get it right and obviously it takes a lot on the body, travelling back to play a game.

“It’s something we’re going to try to work on for the championship.”