Grace Moloney - I'm playing some of my best football ever

After a long absence away from the Ireland camp, Reading FC shot-stopper Grace Moloney has returned to the squad ahead of next week’s European Championship qualifier against Finland and on Friday afternoon she spoke to Extratime.ie about being back amongst the squad.

“Yeah, I’m obviously delighted to be back in,” Moloney said.

“I was back in about three weeks ago for a training session - which was the first time in over a year and a half. I’m really happy to be back involved.”

The goalkeeper was disappointed not to feature in the Ireland squad over the previous year- however, she is quick to explain that she did not play a lot of football for Reading in WSL 2 after a fall out with the then manager Jayne Ludlow.

“I didn’t play last season at club level [with Reading FC in WSL 2] I didn’t get on very well with the manager, we clashed she dropped me and took the captaincy off me. So I was just on the bench all last season, having been playing this season I’ve just been training hard and eventually got the call up.”

Despite spending the majority of the 2014 season on the bench, Moloney revealed that while it knocked her confidence having to look in from the outside, the experience also helped to improve her as a player because it gave her plenty of motivation to earn her place back within the starting XI.

“It did,” she said when asked if it knocked her confidence. “It also made me work harder because obviously I was so used to being number one for Reading for so many years and it gave me a kick up the backside that I need because I was just so used to playing every week, training at one level so it gave me the motivation to want to do more and improve.”

When new manager Kelly Chambers was appointed after Ludlow left to take up a role as Wales National Team manager Moloney was excited to work with Chambers whom she had previously lined out alongside for Reading.

“Our manager now was the assistant and I always wanted to play in the Super League under her so I just stuck it out and trained hard eventually when she took over she always said to me she wanted me to be her number one.”

After putting a troubled of 2014 behind her, Moloney has been a key member of the Reading squad, and when asked if this season has being her best season between the posts the keeper revealed it’s also been her most enjoyable.

“It’s been my most enjoyable season, I’ve really enjoyed it. My best? Yeah, probably has been my best season I got a few man of the matches. I’m really happy with my performances to date, but our season is not done yet. There are a few more games to go so hopefully I can maintain that.”

When asked if her upturn in form was due to Chambers appointed as Reading manager, Moloney was quick to praise her goalkeeping coach Jon Horton, who has brought new ideas which have invigorated Moloney to push on to the next level.

“No if I’m being honest, I’d say my goalie coach is the one that motivates me and drives me every single training session to push myself. He puts a GoPro behind my goal [every game], which he bought out of his own money and done stuff like that with it so I really appreciated it.

“He watches the whole ninety minutes and cuts the bits out where he thinks I’ve done well and what I need to improve on, it makes me think of the things I need to work on in training - so I can then put it into the weekend's game. He’s the one that really helped me improve in the past twelve to eighteen months.”

With just four games remaining in WSL 2, Grace and her teammates have their destiny in their own hands and the goalkeeper is hoping her side can maintain their excellent form and secure promotion to England's top league as Women’s Super League Division 2 Champions.

“We get five points from our remaining four games and we go up, if we win all our games and have a better goal difference than Donny [Doncaster Bells] we win the league. We want to win the league because the celebrations always better if you win it than come second. So that's our main aim now.”

A place in WSL 1, would also allow the keeper to showcase her talents to a wider audience as, BT Sport show games live on a regular basis and her match highlights would also feature on television on a weekly.

Promotion to England’s top league would also bring the possibility of Grace being offered a professional contract and she feels if this was to happen, it would help increase ability to compete with Emma Byrne and Niamh Reid Bourke for the Ireland number one jersey.

“I’d hope so, if/when we go up, some of us will become professional. Hopefully I’ll be one of them, training every day and gym work would help me to improve to be knocking on the door for the number one spot - which is my aim and I love being back involved back here. Everyone in my club knows that it’s my dream to be involved here.”