Colin Falvey

No. 1

Kerala, India ca. 2014 (ISL)

Colin Falvey is from the city of Cork, in southern Ireland. His brogue, though still distinct, has softened considerably during the his time in North America. He played in his final match June 1, 2019, nineteen days before his thirty-fourth birthday, as an emergency starter for Chattanooga Red Wolves S.C., where he was an assistant coach. He scoring the equalizer and receiving a yellow card in the 2-2 draw versus Toronto F.C. II in what would be his final game as a player. Falvey is currently an assistant coach for the Northern Colorado Hailstorm, a U.S.L. League One team based in Windsor, Colorado.

One of the top youth prospects in Cork at the time, Falvey left Ireland for English third division sides Gillingham F.C., and then Carlisle United, but failed to secure a full professional contract with either club. He made his professional debut in 2004, at the age of twenty-three, with Cobh Ramblers in the League of Ireland, scoring in his debut against Athlone Town. After three seasons at Cobh, where he earned a reputation as a hard-tackling center back and an authoritative voice on the pitch and in the dressing room despite his age, Falvey transferred to Kilkenny City for the 2007-2008 season, the club’s last before folding for financial reasons. As a free agent, Falvey garnered interest from lower division English sides, but opted to go play for former Ireland international Terry Phelan at Otago United in New Zealand. Following the 2008 season in New Zealand, Falvey was set to sign with Phelan’s old club, the Charleston Battery in the United States, but the deal was scrapped at the last minute due to the Battery’s overabundant of international players already under contract. Instead, Falvey spent the 2009 season playing in the U.S. third division for Wilmington Hammerheads F.C, returning to New Zealand to play for YoungHeart Manawatu at the conclusion of the season with Wilmington. He returned to North America in early 2010, signing with Charleston, where he played for four seasons, winning league championships in 2010 and 2012. In the final weeks of a disappointing 2014 campaign for the Battery Falvey was sent out on loan to play in the inaugural season of the Indian Super League for Kerala Blasters, which was headlined by former England international goalkeeper David James. Falvey played in front of James, who also coached the team, in the league’s first championship match versus A.T.K. Kerala lost 1-0, conceding the match’s only goal moments before the end of regulation. During the expended Indian Super League off-season, Falvey returned to North America to play for the Ottawa Fury in the second iteration of the North American Soccer League, winning the 2015 Fall Season Championship before losing to the New York Cosmos 2-1 in the N.A.S.L. Soccer Bowl. After contract negotiations for a second season at Kerala fell through, Falvey was sold to Indy Eleven where he was coach by U.S. soccer coaching legend and Charleston Battery co-founder, Tim Hankinson, and where he played with countryman Éamon Zayed for the first time. After two seasons in Indianapolis, Falvey returned to Ottawa for an injury-riddled season after both clubs jumped from the crumbling N.A.S.L. to the U.S.L.

In 2019, Falvey turned down an offer to be New Mexico United’s first ever signing to move to the coaching ranks, joining Hankinson and Zayed for the Chattanooga Red Wolves inaugural season in U.S.L. League One. Both Falvey and Zayed served as player/coaches. Falvey made three emergency appearances for the Red Wolves. In 2020 Falvey was named assistant coach at Sacramento Republic F.C. of the U.S.L. Championship, where he served through 2021 before moving on to Syracuse Pulse of the N.I.S.A. In early 2023 he was reunited with Zayed with the Northern Colorado Hailstorm F.C. of the U.S.L. League One.

Based in Windsor, Colorado, fifty-six miles north of Denver, the Hailstorm was established, along with a minor league baseball team, to anchor the Future Legends Complex, a massive one hundred eighteen-acre multi-sport complex. Initially scheduled to open during the 2022 season, construction delays caused by a protracted investigation when evidence that the site may be a protected historical site forced the club to play its inaugural season in three different stadiums in three different cities. The club will play the 2023 season in a small auxiliary stadium on the Future Legends campus, which they will share with a minor league baseball team co. Next to an outdoor grass field and a multi-use turf field where the Hailstorm trains, is the Future Legends Dome, a massive one hundred sixty-seven thousand square foot indoor facility featuring a full-sized soccer field, nine basketball courts, sixteen volleyball courts, a restaurant, bar, and banquet facilities. It is the largest of its kind in North America, and the third largest of its kind in the world.

The interview took place in the dome after a morning training session in early April, 2023, as the team prepared for a weekend match at the Richmond Kickers. Falvey spent much of the morning working on defensive shape, blowing sharply into a whistle to stop play so he could adjust the positioning of the team in various situations. The season is still early yet. Falvey changed out of his black boots for the interview, wearing dark training shorts and a dark tracksuit top with his initials, CF, on the breast, and running shoes. There are flecks of gray in the beard he wore throughout most of his playing career. We sat at one end of the field on a long aluminum bench and talked while old men played pickleball on the courts behind the goal.

—A.D. Mosier

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INTERVIEWER
The club is just starting its second season, but it already has quite an Open Cup tradition, advancing to the fourth round in 2022. What did you know about it coming in?

COLIN FALVEY
I'm very close with Éamon [Zayed]. We’re always bumping and coaching ideas off each other, football ideas, so I watched a lot of their games last year, I stayed up to touch with what was going on here, obviously seeing their Open Cup win last year with the Switchbacks. And then the next round out there against the Salt Lake. I was well-aware of the run they had in the Open Cup last year. And I was well aware that the Switchbacks were beatable again this year, given my own past, my background within the competition. But regarding that specific game this year, I think the game plan was different from last year, and I thought the players executed very well. We should never have been one-nil down. But we showed the character to come back and win the game comfortably [3-1] in the end. With the players who were here last year, we went into the game with confidence from the result from last year. And that helps going into the game, but obviously still got to go out there and get it done. And thankfully we managed to do that.

INTERVIEWER
During your playing career, how did he approach playing cup matches against teams from higher leagues?

FALVEY
As a player you always want to win. You always want to play at the highest level possible. You always want to compete against top players. In the Open Cup, when you start playing U.S.L. Championship and M.L.S. teams, you're going come across a higher level player, and then you sprinkle in some at a very, very high level, an international level. In Open Cup matches you need to be extra concentrated details because normally, maybe on a Saturday in the league game, if you maybe make one or two mistakes, you might not get punished, you might get away with it. When you come to the higher-level opposition in the Open Cup you will get punished. You have to be extremely focused.

Naturally, you're going to be up for the game, because it's a big occasion, it's a big competition, it's a big opportunity for you as a player to be in the shop window. To move up the levels and maybe have some more eyes on you. It’s a shop window game. You get up for Open Cup games. And yeah, listen, for me it was easy to get up for. For me, the bigger the game the better, the better. I felt like I was more focused and was able to perform.

INTERVIEWER
From where in Ireland are you?

FALVEY
Cork, in southern, Ireland. Cork City.  

INVETVIEWER
What was the name of the first professional club?

FALVEY
League of Ireland club called Cobh Ramblers the were they're one of the two teams within Cork City. Cobh is a little town. It's got plenty of history, actually. Roy Keane came from there. Numerous other professionals came from there. It was one of the stops for the Titanic before it sank, so yeah, so Cobh, for being a small harbor town, it’s quite famous.

That was my first club, and it was great for me from a development point because being the young defender a lot of coaches would not give you games because it's a position where it's a bit tricky. You know, it’s not like putting a striker in for fifteen minutes and see if, maybe, he can bang in a goal or something. I was thankful to go there and really get a good education regarding what professional football, and what men's football, is going to look like moving forward

INVETRIEWER
Tell me about the day you signed your first pro contract.

FALVEY
Obviously, it was a big day for the family. I went to England first, before I signed at Cobh, but never managed to make an appearance in England.

Coming out of high school, I remember telling my friends that I would be moving to England, pursuing my dream had been a professional. And then for me, it was soon as I got a taste of that, having that to be your daily job, coming in every morning to work on something you love was, it was a dream come true. And as soon as I got that taste in England, I wanted a contract. I wanted to try to keep pushing myself and move up the levels. And thankfully I got to have a long enough career, but not only that, I got to see the world and had an interesting career regarding some of the stops I made along the way, which was which was fantastic. At a certain point I started looking at the football as a passport, a way to travel and continue developing and playing see different country countries, different cultures. I didn’t get to the level of that I quite wanted to, but looking back, it was still amazing journey. There’s probably not a lot I wouldn't change.

INTERVIEWER
What took you from Ireland to New Zealand?

FALVEY
I was not really progressing anywhere in the Irish League. I thought I was just stagnant. I Felt like I needed a new challenge and something different, something little bit out of my comfort zone if you want, because I was living at home at the time. It was the ex-Irish international, Terry Phelan, who played for the Charleston Battery, that got me over there. Obviously, it was an honor to get a call from somebody like him, giving his Irish background and what he's done for the national team. When he calls, you sit up and take notice. At first, I'm not going to lie, I was kind of unsure about New Zealand. I didn't know what the level of football was like. I knew they were a big rugby country, but he explained it well, and said I would enjoy it and it would open up a lot of different avenues for me. It was something different, but I think he's he was correct in saying it was going to open up a lot more avenues and doors in Asia, Australia, and just threw his own contacts, it ended up opening doors in the U.S., which is where I've now spent most of my career, so it's funny how it works out.

INTERVIEWER
What was the level of play in New Zealand?

FALVEY
It reminds me, not the level of play as much, but in structure of the Scottish League, where you have Celtic and Rangers, the top two teams, and everyone else was miles behind. In New Zealand they had the two top teams there who were much, much higher level than the rest of the league. They were qualifying for FIFA World Club Cups. These teams were able to compete with the top U.S.L. Championship teams. And then the rest of the clubs was a bit of a mixed bag, you know, anywhere between the U.S.L. Championship and U.S.L. League One. Each team could only have three foreigners, which affected the level as well. But I get it why they're doing that. They're trying to develop their own game and New Zealand players. Overall, it surprised me. It was quite competitive and decent, and I definitely enjoyed my time there.

Manawatu, New Zealand ca. 2010 (Warick Smigh/Manawatu Standard)

INTERVIEWER
You went from New Zealand to the Wilmington Hammerheads. How was how did that come about? What did you get from your time at Wilmington?

FALVEY
I got a taste of life in the U.S. Wilmington is a lovely beach town. Coming from Ireland, having that kind of weather that access to the beach, that was all new to me and mind-blowing, that that you could have that lifestyle every day. And then it introduced me to the U.S.L., which at the time was—and still is—a very, very rough-and-ready, athletic, physical league. That was my introduction to football here in the States.

It's funny because I was due to sign with Charleston originally. But Charleston didn't have an international spot. We were talking with Mike Anhaeuser. Terry Phalen played for the Battery and had a good connection with Mike. The transfer window in Europe was closed. That's why I was looking at the U.S., because they the timing was good, and the season was just about to start as I was finishing in New Zealand. The Charleston move didn't work out because they basically had too many international guys on the roster. That’s how Wilmington got involved.

Obviously, the club’s just up the road. There was a good relationship between both clubs. There was an agreement put in place: go to Wilmington, do well, and if things open up in Charleston and we'll readdress that. That's actually what ended up happening.

INTERVIEWER
Charleston was, at the time, and still very much is, kind of the standard bearer for lower division clubs in the US. How did it differ from other lower-division clubs in the U.S.?

FALVEY
If you ask the majority of just the average soccer fan in the U.S., ‘Name a club outside of M.L.S.’ I think the majority will probably say the Charleston Battery just given its history and successful tradition.

From a very beginning were able to compete with M.L.S. teams on a regular basis, whether that was in preseason tournaments, whether that was in U.S. Open Cups. In 2008, against D.C. United I think it was, they got to the Open Cup final, and maybe should have won it. Obviously, there is a lot of history within the club. I was made well aware that. Even when you walk in the door for the first time when you walked upstairs to the pub, you could tell the club had a big community feel to it had. It had a special feeling. I knew that as soon as I walked in. They have had some really successful teams there. It was an honor to add on to the history and success that they've already built.

And it's good to see them getting back on track because it's been a tough couple of years. A big, big club like that should always, in my opinion, be at the top end of the U.S.L. Championship.

My time with the Battery was amazing. It's a special club. I keep saying that. I think that's got to do with the people and the community that you that you meet as soon as you get there. Now it's my second home in the U.S. Anytime I get an offseason, if I'm out of work, I'm always there. I have a feeling—you never know—but I have a feeling, when I'm done with football, I'll end up there, I think. But you never know, right? It's a journey that I'm on right now and we'll see where it takes me.

Charleston, South Carolina ca. 2013 (Charleston City Paper)

INTERVIEWER
You won championships with Battery in 2010 and 2012. What was the difference between the two teams?