Irish Hockey Association chief executive Mike Heskin said that the senior men's national team was "simply not gelling" with coach Andrew Meredith, a situation that led to his departure last Friday evening after 14-months in charge.
With reaching a first Olympics the primary target, Heskin felt that not enough progress was being made toward and, with the qualification route beginning in earnest in early 2015, the time was right to part company with Meredith.
Ireland came agonisingly close to reaching London 2012, falling to Korea 3-2 in an Olympic qualification final in Dublin, conceding the vital goal with less than ten seconds remaining.
Meredith took over the side from Paul Revington six months after that tournament with an impressive CV including two Olympic gold medals as Germany's assistant coach.
His tenure started well with a bronze medal at the Champions Challenge I in Buenos Aires but, following that success, Ireland stagnated. A seventh place finish in Rotterdam at the World League semi-finals saw Ireland miss out on the World Cup while, despite strong showings in the group phases, they just about scraped clear of relegation in August’s European championships.
Heskin felt that, following reviews with the players and the coaching staff after the Europeans, there was not the right formula in place to reach Rio in 2016.
“From the start, the aim is to reach the Olympics in 2016,” he told the Irish Times. “We came close to doing it 2012, so we had to put together a team that could be even better. Progress was adequate but whether it was going to move us on, possibly not.
“We are holding our position in the world ranking but, let’s be honest, it is not going to get us to where we want to be.”
From that review, it was also requested that Meredith spend more time in Ireland viewing players in club and interprovincial action. While he fulfilled this brief, spending time away from his family in Germany proved a strain, especially since the birth of his first child.
The chief executive feels that the timing of Meredith’s departure was right with 2014 a low-key year on the international calendar. They have just one world ranking tournament on the agenda - the Champions Challenge I in Malaysia in April - before Ireland start their qualification bid in 2015 in Lancaster, USA.
It gives Meredith’s successor time to sculpt their high performance programme with a long lead-in to the Olympic push. Heskin confirmed that the IHA will start the recruitment process for the new coach in January.
Meredith, meanwhile, will continue to work with FC St Pauli in a sports analysis role.
