New Ireland women’s national team head coach Thomas Garlepp was cautious about his goals but open about his ambition in an extensive interview with Emmet Ryan
It’s Ireland week on BallinEurope and we’re off to a big start. Ireland will enter November’s EuroBasket Women 2029 pre-qualifiers with a new head coach at the helm. Thomas Garlepp, from Australia, has stepped in to replace James Weldon.
After Ireland recorded its first two ever wins in qualifying in the last campaign, with a pair of wins over Bosnia & Herzegovina, Garlepp has a big challenge ahead of him. The task is only made tougher by the fact that he will spend most of his time on the other side of the world in Sydney, Australia.
The distance issue
Sydney is on the far side of the world from Dublin and is either 7 or 9 hours ahead of the Irish capital depending on the time of year. Garlepp was up front about the extra layer this brings to the task ahead.
“It was an upfront conversation before the interview even happened. In terms of just the how from a volunteer capacity and taking care of those travel arrangements on my end, and really devoting myself and my family, having an understanding of what the commitment actually is, was the first part,” Garlepp told BallinEurope.
“I come from a family pretty entrenched in basketball. My wife’s the head coach of the Sydney Flames here in Sydney. I dropped her off at the airport just a couple of hours ago as she’s an assistant coach with the Opals, so she’ll be in Berlin.”
The interview took place before the Opals endured an injury-riddled FIBA Women’s World Cup, where they reached the quarter final.
“Knowing that I had the support of the most important people in my life, it prompted some further decision making and planning, and and just kind of wrapping my head around exactly the level of thorough planning that be required,”
“If I’m going to set some standards and meet the players where they’re at with respect to what they’d like to achieve and the standards they like to set, a lot of that is going to have to be remote.”
Garlepp intends to arrive in Ireland well ahead of international windows where possible but acknowledged that a lot of work would be required to make everything in between succeed.
“I will obviously be able to arrive ahead of time to some of these windows and put some processes in place, but the time spent here, particularly with respect to the time zones and the differences there, I am going to have to be really organised,” he said.
“I’ve been involved career-wise in terms of juggling multiple teams at once. Being in Australia and undergoing World Cup campaigns is always fraught with a lot of unexpected things, and you’ve got to be adaptable and organised,”
“I want to build something that I’m really proud of with these players. And you know, look, It’s going to be a challenge, just like anything worth doing is. But I’m confident that I’ve thought it through and that I’m ready to give it a crack.”
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The immediate task
Garlepp brings a strong resume with him to the role. He has substantial experience coaching in NBL 1, Australia’s second tier, while he guided the Australian U17 women to the bronze medal at this summer’s FIBA U17 World Cup. Save for an assistant role in high school, he’s set all of those aside to focus on November’s qualifiers.
“Most of my planning at the moment is going into [the] Iceland [game]. I’m aware of their better players, the way they like to play, and I’m fleshing out some ideas relative to what I’ve learnt there, to what we have, and the opportunities we have,” said Garlepp.
“I’ll probably go a little bit more in depth into Azerbaijan and Switzerland over the coming weeks, but for right now I’ve been just watching a lot of Iceland in particular.”
Ireland captain Edel Thornton was the only current squad member that he had reached out to prior to Friday as his announcement was under embargo.
“I just introduced myself and said I’d love to have the opportunity to chat, and she was nice enough to respond, and we’ll set up a time when it works for her. I’ll do the same with a lot of probably the senior players to start,” he said.
“I’d certainly be interested in having every, you know, beyond the 12 that were a part of those windows last year. I really want to make sure everyone feels heard and seen. There’s a bright future ahead for Irish basketball, but there’s also some fantastic players here now, they’ve all got to know that I’m keeping an eye on them, and I care about them.”
The retirement of Bridget Herlihy during the last qualification campaign has put the import slot somewhat in flux. So far, Garlepp hasn’t identified a player or position he wants to target for it.
“I think in time I will, and probably not in the too distant future at all. I think for the time being I am really familiarising myself with the locals and just making sure I extend those olive branches and give them a sense of who I am,”
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The coaching set-up
Garlepp plans for his coaching team to be based in Ireland, and he plans to set about identifying candidates to join his staff in short order.
“There are some names within Ireland that I’m familiar with and I certainly have a lot of respect for a number of Irish coaches. The one thing I do know is I’m looking local, and I think with respect to ensuring that we set good, positive functional standards for the players within Ireland is really important to me,” he said.
“I’ve got to learn more about the cohort who’s available. That’s a really immediate to-do for me. But with respect to building that staff, having them Irish based is really important.”
Vague on goals
The part that may disappoint most observers was Garlepp not committing to specific targets in terms of results, at least at this stage, in terms of goals for this upcoming campaign or the subsequent one should he be retained.
“I certainly plan on being here for multiple campaigns, and that’s my intention. With respect to goals and expectations, I’ll be honest with you, my expectation is that we just go for it and really enjoy it,” he said.
“Whatever happens on the other side of that, we’ll set standards together. We will play every game to try and win, as anyone would. But you know, putting a number on it for me…my goals would probably be a little bit more specific. You know, are we really enjoying it? Are we sharing the ball? What’s the level of fight and defence we’re playing? Like those are more the things that I’ll be really looking at.”
I pressed him for more specifics but Garlepp said that he didn’t want to focus on such targets.
“I suppose [with] expectations. That’s the media’s job. My job is to remove them. Like, I want the players to feel like they’re 10 feet tall. They’re ready to go and let rip and leave everything on the court. And if that results in wins, which of course we will always try and win everything we’re a part of, for me, that’s all I care about. And if we happen to win games in the process, awesome,”
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