Gavin Hoey - from groundsman to Ireland's next (possible) new cap
Pembroke leg-spinner started the summer tending to grass pitches but is likely to end it with a maiden international cap
With Gavin Hoey, take your pick of interesting storylines.
Ahead of Ireland’s white ball games against South Africa in the UAE, that he is likely to be the country’s newest cap is noteworthy in and of itself.
That a potential debut may come after Hoey suffered a stress fracture in his back as a teenager is heart-warming enough. That he earned an international call-up as a leg-spinner having only picked up the skill during the pandemic is difficult to fathom. That he started Ireland’s only home series of the summer on the ground staff and finished it on the other side of the boundary as a sub-fielder only adds to the charm.
Hoey, aged 22, has been in Ireland squads before. He was one of three spinners picked ahead of a Test against Zimbabwe in July, only for Andy McBrine and Matthew Humphreys to get the nod in the final XI.
Hoey was also a late call-up ahead of the third T20 vs Pakistan back in May after Gareth Delany tweaked his groin. Again, he didn’t make the XI but did field at Clontarf, just days after lugging around the heavy roller. Though he is on a retainer contract with Cricket Ireland, Hoey still works for GM By Choice, the groundskeeping company run by Dale McDonough which looks after a number of clubs in Leinster.
“That’s just cricket in Ireland,” laughs Hoey. “It’s so tight knit. I’ve been working with Dale for six years, I’ve done all the summers since I was about 16. He’s been brilliant for me.
“He lets me work before training, after training, even at training. I’ve done that for the Leinster Lightning, roll the wicket beforehand, play on it, clean it up after. It’s funny.”
For a number of years now, Hoey’s name frequently comes up in conversations on promising psopects in Leinster cricket circles. On raw talent alone, his combination of leg-spin and lower order power hitting appeals; a similar skillset to Gareth Delany, only Hoey is four years younger.
A stress fracture is all too familiar for fast bowlers. Hoey suffered one as a promising seamer back in 2019, leading to a career-altering decision, made in conjunction with his father, when the pandemic first hit the year after. “I tried to bowl a few seamers in lockdown and the back was sore again,” explains Hoey. “We made a decision there, let’s go down every day and bowl leggies on the running track in Blackrock. That’s what we did.
“That first day when I gave seam bowling a crack was, ‘oh jayus’, pretty disappointing. But something that was disappointing turned out to be a bit of a blessing for me.”
In some ways, the hardest part of leg-spin bowling came easily. Yet the basics were lacking. “I could only really bowl a big toppy and a googly,” says Hoey. “I just gradually decided to work on the leg-spinner. That’s taken away from the big, massive googly that I have, but it’s still there a little bit.
“I have no idea why [I couldn’t bowl a leg-spinner]. Even when I was a kid, messing around with dad, bowling leggies in the nets, googlies came out. Which is strange, my dad never bowled a googly. It was just a leggy.”
Hoey’s father, Conor, also played for Ireland as a leg-spinner. That is where the similarities end. “He was a very natural leg-spinner, I was more looking for technique” says Hoey.
“He’d say, ‘I just hold the ball back when I want to bowl slower’ - ‘I don’t know what that means, dad.’ It’s been pretty cool to have him the whole journey, trying to figure it out. He’d be the person I talk to about cricket the whole time. I trust and value what he thinks, he was the one who kept me going.”
That was 2020. Come 2021, a Leinster Lightning debut came under the tutelage of Nigel Jones, a coach Hoey describes as a “legend”. Former Ireland boss Graham Ford also comes in for praise. The two first started working together when Hoey was tending to the ground during an Ireland training session.
“I’d been bowling leggies for six months. Fordy liked them and said ‘will you bowl in the nets at the Irish lads?’ I was thinking, ‘this is class.’ You just pick up different things from different people. Fordy was excellent in his own way, gave you confidence in terms of what he sees in you and your potential. He gives you a steer to keep sticking at it - ‘it will come one day.’”
Hoey’s natural attributes, bowling relatively quick and flat while finding occasional drift, turned heads. His numbers are also good. Since his interpro debut, Hoey averages just 18 with the ball with an economy under five in 50-over matches. Interpro figures aren’t the determining factor behind Irish selection, but they certainly help.
“The interpros expose you to a higher standard,” says Hoey. “Club cricket has gotten better the last couple of years - the standard is very high now. You feel like you’re doing well but then you go to the interpros and you get whacked about. ‘Oh, I have to drag my length back.’
“It exposes you, especially when all the internationals are playing. It shows you the standard you have to be at. It keeps you in check, drives you to what you have to do in terms of training. It’s a standard checker.”
The interpros have received their fair share of criticism this year, with plenty pointing to a declining standard and diminishing player buy-in. Even if the competition has taken a step back, when Hoey first entered the fray it provided a step up from club level.
Once capped, Hoey succeeding would be a big win for Cricket Ireland and the interpros. Broadly speaking, the development arc of this current Ireland squad can be put into four camps. At the back end of their careers you have the last of the county pros, those who spent their formative years in England; Paul Stirling, Andrew Balbirnie et al. Then you have the first non-county generation, the likes of Harry Tector and Lorcan Tucker, those who grew up with interpro cricket which included First Class matches. There is also the cohort of players who played abroad as youngsters, Curtis Campher and Graham Hume being examples.
Hoey is part of a new generation, the post-Covid interpro babies who don’t have any real grounding in red ball cricket. Ross Adair also falls into this bracket. To an extent, so does Neil Rock after he responded to being dropped in 2021 by developing his power game with the Northern Knights. None of those players have yet become international regulars. Given Ireland’s quest for a wicket-taking spinner in 50-over cricket, there is a gap for Hoey to be the first.
That lack of red ball cricket, somewhat inevitably, combined with Hoey’s late change to leg-spin has him playing catch-up. Apart from his dad, Ireland spin coach Chris Brown was the first true specialist to work with the Pembroke man. Support from spin experts wasn’t forthcoming at domestic level. As with plenty of Irish players, let alone spinners, talent alone is what gets you to the top. The specialist coaching required to thrive only comes then.
“Browny’s been so good,” says Hoey. “I was crying out for it after I went on the Emerging Ireland tour to the West Indies last year. I didn’t know what I was doing.
“I’m still figuring it out but Browny gave me that sort of clarity, ‘this is what I want you to do, rip up the back of the ball, this is going to get you drop, dip.’ In my head I thought I wanted to bowl side spinners, but you actually want to bowl that 45 degreee angle when the ball is coming out of your hand. It’s probably common knowledge but I didn’t know. I was just trying to spin it. His knowledge is excellent.”
Hoey is also a case study in the challenges of being a young professional in Ireland. Last year, when he trained with the national squad, he was on a casual contract which offered no salary. Instead, coaching, medical attention and strength and conditioning facilities were the benefits forthcoming.
Having graduated from Trinity College earlier this year, Hoey now receives a salary that covers his labour until the end of October. He still works as a groundsman. Expenses from playing with Emerging Ireland were more than welcome. International sport is a privilege, but as a young, unproven prospect, it isn’t always a simple financial process.
“It’s not easy,” agrees Hoey. “You’re training as if you’re a full time pro but you’re not. It’s your decision to make. You hope that it will pay off at some time in the future.
“It was a very busy third and fourth year in college, running around training, lectures, training again. I loved it, I wouldn’t have it any other way. Cricket is what I want to do so it’s definitely worth the commitment.”
A commitment which should lead to a debut in one of the three ODIs against South Africa. Hoey is hoping that his father will fly out to the UAE for the occasion. Ireland doesn’t produce many top end spinners. Soon, two would-be internationals are set to have come from the same family.
Irish players are always going to be raw when they first enter the international arena. Starting cricket's hardest skill so late ensures Hoey will be all the more so. Yet few Irish spinners have created such cautiously optimistic murmurs. How long it takes for results to match the anticipation - if they ever do - remains to be seen. For now, given all that has gone before, joining his father as an international cricketer is a good start.