Grace O’Flanagan happy to turn her focus to hockey after tough year

Trainee surgeon and Ireland goalkeeper looking forward to Olympic Games

Mary Hannigan


Irish hockey international Grace O’Flanagan is encouraging people to sign up for this year’s Darkness Into Light, which takes place this Saturday, May 8th. Photograph: Dan Sheridan/Inpho

Having to vie with the mighty Ayeisha McFerran for a place in the Irish hockey team means Grace O’Flanagan would be entitled to regard herself as one of our more unfortunate international sports people. But since making her Irish debut almost a decade ago the 32-year-old Dubliner has played her own pivotal role in the team’s story, battling back from a life-threatening illness to do so. And now she’s working on featuring in the next chapter of that story which will take place in Tokyo this summer at the Olympic Games.