Basketball Ireland today confirmed the appointment of James Weldon as the new head coach of the Irish senior women's team.
Weldon will assume the role on January 1st, 2019 and will coach the squad up until the conclusion of the 2020 FIBA Women’s European Championship for Small Countries. He has a wealth of international coaching experience already, namely stints as head coach of the Irish Senior Women’s Select team (2012, 2013 and 2015), assistant coach to Hibernia Senior Men’s team (2015) and Head Coach of the Irish Under 18 women’s team (2005, 2007 and 2013).
At club level, Weldon was the head coach of the UL Huskies senior women’s team that won three premier league titles, two national Cup titles, and four regular-season titles.
Addressing his appointment, the Killarney native said that "I’m honoured that I have been afforded this opportunity by the EPC and the Women’s committee. My coaching team and I will do everything we can over the next year and a half to get the players up to the required levels for international basketball. Over the next few months we will be scouting the leagues, monitoring players and potential players abroad. It’s an exciting time to be involved with the team".
Weldon was also involved with the Kerry footballers in the last 12 months, and was drafted in by Eamon Fitzmaurice ahead of the 2018 season. Speaking in May, Fitzmaurice hailed his impact.
I’m delighted with him.
The big thing with James, because there are aspects of basketball and football that are so transferable, we wanted our thinking as a management challenged, and he has done that.
He has taken parts of training here and there, and he has a different eye and a different take on things. He’s involved in both defence and offensively, he has ideas on both. He has good, good ideas, and great manner.
