Local sporting hero Pat Mullins poised for national honours

A member of one of Limerick’s best known sporting families is facing an anxious wait before he knows if he will become one of the rare people from this City to be honoured by the FAI.

For the second year in succession, Garryowen man Pat Mullins is one of three nominees for the prestigious Schoolboys Player Of The Year award.

The winner will be announced at a gala ceremony to be held at City West on February 3, when the senior international and other award winners will also be announced.

A schoolboys international for the past two years, Pat has played against Malta, twice, and Hungary. He was captain of the Irish Schoolboys team in 2007, for matches against England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

It was his performances in those games which played a major part in him being one of the three players nominated for the Schoolboys Player Of The Year award.

Pat’s first school was St John The Baptist, where he played soccer, hurling and Gaelic football: “Seamus Long and Colm Casey were my early coaches and we won the under eleven and a half football title twice, and we also won the U13 hurling and football. Amongst those on the teams with me were John Mullane, Conor Kavanagh and David and Shane Considine,” he said.

Moving on to Limerick CBS, Pat continued to play all three sports. “We reached the U13 Munster Soccer final in my first year there and I was captain when we won the Munster Schools U16 Championship, with Shane Treacy, Shane Duggan, Jonathan Grant and Christopher O’Neill also on the side,” he added.

One of Pat’s early sporting highlights was when he played on the winning side in two Munster Schools U18 finals. “I was at centre-half and had the honour of being captain of one of winning sides, which included Shane Clarke, Brian Collopy, Jeffrey Judge, Shay Considine, Eoin Hanrahan and Pat Coleman,” he told me.

From U10 to U16 Pat played with Geraldines and was a member of several successful sides.

Pat is now studying Sports Management at UCD which has a number of different modules, including theory of coaching, sports marketing, IT, financial management and biology.