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Supple: Still No Regrets - Ipswich Town News

Former Town goalkeeper Shane Supple still has no regrets about his decision to retire from professional football six years ago, he told Josh Prenderville when he caught up with him in Dublin recently.

The former Irish U21 international left the club in August 2009 after having "fallen out of love with the game".

Supple, now 28, is now working as a football consultant arranging trials and contracts for young Irish players hoping to make the grade in England. He has also recently resumed his playing career at amateur level for Crumlin United in the Leinster Senior League.

"Still no regrets! At the time, some of the more senior professionals didn't really care a whole lot whether we won or lost on a Saturday.

"I was thinking 'this isn't what I thought it was, I thought everyone was supposed to be fighting for the cause'. I kept at it but still wasn't really enjoying it," Supple said.

The former Town academy product admits that his decision wasn't an impulsive one, and was several years in the making.

"At the time we were pushing for promotion, it was the 2004/05 season, the year Wigan went up. We were up there and the lads were worried about if they'd get another contract if we did get promoted, and that if we were in the play-offs their holidays were going to be eaten into for a couple of weeks. It was around that time I started thinking about it."

Supple also had spells on loan at Falkirk and Oldham Athletic, but says that neither move helped change his feelings towards the game.

"Even when I went out on loan, people just didn't have the club's best interests at heart. It wasn't really much different and that was difficult for me to understand.

"At Oldham it was the same, even with Joe Royle, the man who gave me my chance and I have so much time for him, but I knew it wasn't going to be the career for me in the end," he said.

Supple, who was a member of Town's 2005 FA Youth Cup-winning side, says he had made his mind up long before Roy Keane took over from Jim Magilton as Blues boss in April 2009.

"I came back for the new season [after being on loan at Oldham] and Roy offered me a new deal, but to be honest I only signed it to get my stuff in order.

"I wasn't nervous because at that point my mind was made up and to be fair to Roy, he was very good in the way he dealt with it.

The former Town shot stopper also recalled the infamous 'army camp' that Roy Keane arranged for the Town squad in the summer of 2009.

"That army camp was probably the most enjoyable time over there! We were split into four teams and I managed to be put into a team with Jon Walters and Gareth McAuley, which I was delighted about, they were decent guys, decent professionals.

"I remember Roy doing the monkey bars, and he came off it and landed on his backside! I remember looking at the boys and we didn't know what to do. Roy got back up again and tried to do it, and I think he slipped again.

"Roy is obviously a determined man and managed to do it in the end, but we had a chuckle about that coming home. Physically, it was so demanding. I remember nearly blacking out at the end of it."

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