Experienced Dublin defender Jonny Cooper has rejected claims that he’s a deliberately cynical and ‘nasty’ player who trades in ‘cute whorism’.
Tyrone legend Owen Mulligan made the comments after Dublin’s All-Ireland final win when he spoke positively of Cooper and said “he dives as if he’s been shot by a sniper and he fouls cynically in all the right areas”.
Mulligan said Tyrone were “blessed with nasty bastards in the back line” when they won three All-Irelands in the 2000s and said Cooper is of a similar ilk. “I’m a massive fan of Jonny Cooper, the Sergio Ramos of Dublin,” said Mulligan.
Cooper said he presumed it was a compliment though maintained that he isn’t, intentionally at least, a nasty player.
“I think sometimes comments like that can pick up a bit of traction and then they can kind of snowball into, ‘He is a particular type of player’,” said Cooper.
“I wouldn’t see myself as that player. Maybe incidents over the year, and years, have maybe contributed towards people having that opinion but, look, when you play a game in a finite amount of space and time to make a potential decision, sometimes you get it wrong.
“I don’t intentionally go out to play in that way, in a nasty way, if that’s what people refer to me as. I don’t know, I like to be known as someone who tries and is honest in what they do but if that somewhat oversteps the line, unintentionally from my point of view, then so be it.”
Mulligan’s caricature of Cooper of a fearless, old school defender who isn’t afraid to play on the very edge, is only half the picture.
He’s also constantly trying to improve himself and spent a couple of days at Saracens rugby club earlier this month, picking their brains for information and tips that might help his game.
He also visited Leinster Rugby and plans to chat with Ireland’s elite amateur boxers and anyone else he might be able to learn from.
“I met a guy from Saracens at a conference this time last year and we just stayed in touch and we’ve bounced stuff off each other, in terms of ideas,” said Cooper. “It just came about through there. They were very open in terms of what they’re willing to share and it was very good in terms of what I learned for those couple of days.
“You’re just trying to do those things in the off-season and to get a bit of value in a personal sense, as opposed to just hitting the gym or running.
“I took away a few things, that we’re not actually that different from professional athletes, in the sense that a lot of the same components go into it in terms of analysis and work on technical skills.”
Cooper hopes to put all the information he’s gathered to good use as a footballer but also away from the pitch. He’s undertaken a Masters Degree in organisational behaviour at DCU and fancies stepping into the area of executive coaching at some stage.
“The GPA have a really good person, Fran (O’Reilly), who does a lot of work with people in terms of their off-field development,” said Cooper.
“He’s someone I found very useful and somebody I would have maybe liked to follow into that particular area, maybe not exactly what he’s doing but in terms of the health and the value that he actually added to me and people that I know. That type of experience I would hope to have myself in potentially a professional sense.”