OF THE 600-plus games Eoin Doyle played during his career in different countries, there is only one official attendance he can remember.
The 36,101 that turned out to see Sligo beat Shamrock Rovers 2-0 on penalties after a scoreless draw between the sides over 120 minutes during the 2010 FAI Cup final.
It was not Doyleโs first cup final. He had played the year before in Tallaght and scored in the 2-1 defeat by Sporting Fingal.
Nor was it his last โ he also played the following year when Sligo beat Shelbourne 4-1 on penalties.
In England, he was also part of four promotion triumphs โ three of which were title wins โ and made three appearances in the PFA Team of the Year.
Yet Doyle says that the 2010 game is the most memorable game he was ever involved in.
โIt was the first I ever felt like โthis is proper footballโ where itโs a big stadium, big crowd, the roar of the fans and that sort of stuff,โ he tells The 42.
Ideally, Doyle would have loved to have made a fourth FAI Cup final appearance next weekend as St Patrickโs Athletic take on Bohemians in the 2023 campaignโs showpiece event.
The original plan was to finish the season with the Saints, but instead, Doyle unexpectedly announced his retirement last July, with his final appearance coming in the Europa Conference League defeat to F91 Dudelange at Richmond Park.
โI donโt miss it, if Iโm being honest,โ he says. โI feel like Iโve done my time on the pitch.
โMyself and [my wife] Ciara were watching a match yesterday and I just said to her: โI canโt believe we used to do that for a living.โ I was just watching it on the telly.
โBut Iโve fond memories and no regrets, it was an enjoyable time.โ
Doyle cited โpersonal reasonsโ for his retirement at the time and is comfortable elaborating now on a difficult period on and off the pitch.
โCiaraโs mam was in palliative care and she passed away in August. So basically, what happened was when she went into the hospice โ usually when you go into a hospice itโs two weeks but she lasted two months, and it was really hard for me to juggle family life and football.
โWhat was happening was, I was missing training. I definitely wasnโt doing the gym work in the afternoons just so I could get back as much as possible to Ciara to relieve her so she could go in and spend as much time with her mam.
โTo be fair it got to the stage where I wasnโt performing for Patโs because I was missing training. I was coming on and making us worse โ thatโs what it felt like and thatโs what it was
โI felt bad for Ciara in the sense that she should just be in there 24/7 with her mam. I took her away from here to England for a decade. She backed me through my whole career. So I thought it was the best option for everyone to pack it up there and then. For me to focus on my kids while Ciara was looking after her mam. That was the reason for the abrupt retirement.
โIt was a tough decision but once myself and Ciara talked about it, it was [decided] it had to be done. Iโve no regrets about how it ended. I have to look after the family. Thatโs always been number one through everything.โ
Family is also the primary reason why Doyle doesnโt see himself getting into coaching or management anytime soon.
โI donโt see myself on the grass. But listen, footballโs mad, in two years, anything could change my mind.
โIโm mindful of jumping back into football knowing that Iโd miss a lot of my kidsโ stuff if I do that. Because itโs all in once youโre in and I donโt really want to do that. Iโve missed a lot over the years with playing.
โIโve loved watching their stuff. Iโve helped out with my eldest ladโs team, training them on Wednesday. I donโt want to miss any of that by taking a job in football.โ
Doyle laughs, while recounting a recent exchange: โMy little boy asked me the other day why am I not a manager. I said to him: โWell, I could go and try to be a manager but you wouldnโt see me very much.โ
โHe was like โokay,โ and then he started slagging me: โSure youโre only on your phone when youโre here anyway.โ I was like: โYeah, thatโs a good pointโ. I had to put the phone down realising what I was doing.โ
Not that Doyle can fully sit back and relax now. He currently runs a childcare business, Lilyโs, with close friend and ex-Sligo teammate Danny Ventre.
There are four in operation in Dublin, including one at Doyleโs first schoolboy club, Firhouse Carmel.
โWhen we open planned we put in movable partition walls. So in the evenings and weekends, the clubs use them as dressing rooms.
โIn the mornings my staff come in and open the doors up and itโs open plan for our kids to come in for the childcare.
โItโs a good model and itโs something Iโm going to try to replicate now in football clubs across the country if we can.
โI spoke with the FAI and talks are still ongoing with that. They like the idea, so with a bit of funding and imagination, itโs something that could be really positive for football.โ
He continues: โOver the years, Iโd have been very afraid of retiring because I loved it so much when I was playing.
โI was thinking โI canโt believe this has to end one day.โ I would have read books and looked into a lot of things on basically how to not be depressed when you retire โ Iโm not someone who suffers from it anyway.
โBut to summarise everything I read over the years, it was to make sure youโre busy and occupied when youโre done. I was able to set myself up to be like that.โ
*****
Doyle can reflect now on a brilliant time in football that encompassed over 200 goals.
โI definitely maximised my career with the ability that I had,โ he says.
โI committed my body to it 100%, did the maddest things over the years to make sure I was in prime shape.โ
Yet he admits a career in professional football may not have ever happened had it not been for the recession that left him without full-time employment in 2008.
โIโm a qualified electrician so Iโve managed to get the last bit done to get signed off and then there was no work in 2008 and I was part-time at Rovers 21s at the time.
โI only played a couple of games with the 21s and I was up training with the first team in the evenings.
โAnd then when the work was gone, it was: โThis is it, I can throw myself into the football.โ
โSo I was making sure I was in the gym every morning โ myself and [ex-Rovers teammate] Simon Madden used to make sure we were up there in the morning with training in the afternoons and evenings with the team. And it paid off, I suppose. I went all in because there was no other choice. There was no option to get a job at the time.โ
Doyle came of age at a time when there was not the same level of professionalism in the League of Ireland as there is now.
โI had a great time at Rovers. [Pat] Scully brought me through. He was good craic. And then obviously, Michael OโNeill came in and it felt like the club changed overnight in the sense of Tallaght [becoming the home stadium].
โI came on for Bradser [Stephen Bradley] in the first game in Tallaght and the club got really professional, really quickly.โ
The Hoops had a significant number of quality strikers on the books and game time was tough to come by, so a young Doyle sought opportunities elsewhere after a couple of seasons.
He signed for Paul Cookโs Sligo on the recommendation of former Ireland international and ex-Shamrock Rovers assistant caretaker coach, Alan Moore.
From there, Doyle was instrumental in helping to kickstart a highly successive period for the Bit OโRed, appearing in three successive FAI Cup finals, while the club won just the third league title in their history the year after he left.
After an exceptional 2011 season that saw Doyle score 20 goals in 34 Premier Division appearances, clubs across the water began to take notice.
Terry Butcherโs Inverness expressed interest, but in the end, Doyle opted to link up with Pat Fenlonโs Hibs.
โWhen I went over, it wasnโt a great deal,โ he recalls. โI could have got that money at Sligo potentially, no problem. But it was just an opportunity to kind of go over and see what you can do and take a punt at it.
โThe first game was the derby against Hearts. I came on in the last five or six minutes and the stature of the athletes was night and day compared to Ireland. So I just hammered the gym for the first six months I was there.
โI had an 18-month deal so it was January to the summer obviously at the back end of the season. I just hammered the gym, to try and get my body up to where it should be to be over there and on the pitch.
โI did a number of interviews at the time. I remember being honest with people, especially when the second season started, saying itโs โmake or break this for me nowโ.
โโIf I donโt do it now, Iโll be back in Ireland next year. So Iโm giving everything I can,โ type of thing and I had a great time.โ
Doyleโs appearances in the 2012 and 2013 Scottish Cup finals meant he had featured in a cup final in either Ireland or Scotland five years in a row, though he came out on the losing side on both occasions with Hibs.
His last game in Scotland was that 2013 cup final โ a disappointing 3-0 defeat by Celtic.
โThe second year, it was so noisy. I remember coming out and getting a fright. A firework went off and it felt like it was in my pocket right beside me. The electricity in the place was unreal. Just a sea of green โ the Hibs and Celtic fans in the stadium, it was amazing.
โIโll never forget that match. Early in the first half, I missed a header. Fraser Forster saved it. Celtic scored straight away up the other end. We would have been 1-0 up. Thatโs one of the only moments in my career that I look back in my career and not that I regret what I did, but in the moment, you go: โFuck I wish I had slotted that in.โโ
Ultimately though, Doyle had done enough to stay in Britain and enjoyed a reunion with former Sligo boss Paul Cook at Chesterfield in 2013.
โThe difference [with Ireland] I found when I came back was just the athleticism. Thereโs not that much pace in the league here compared to when I came back from League One. There are a lot of really fast skilful players over there, powerful men, whereas thatโs not really the case here.
โThat was the biggest difference โ I found training in England mid-season would have been harder than pre-season in Ireland. Not for the fact that the sessions were different โ they werenโt, the coaches here are excellent. It was just the athleticism. For me to keep up with the lads in League One was really hard.โ
After 32 league goals in 69 appearances in two seasons for Chesterfield including promotion to League One, Doyle made another step up, signing for Championship side Preston.
โWhen I went to Cardiff, again, just the athleticism, everyone seemed so much bigger immediately on the pitch and so much faster. And that was the real difference.
โRegarding the style of football, it wasnโt much different if Iโm being honest. League One, there was probably more football being played than in the Championship. It could be a bit more direct at times because you had the likes of Kenwyne Jones up front and you should hit them early because heโs really good in the air.
โSo you played to your personnel. And that personnel was there in the Championship. So I found it a bit more direct at times compared to what I was playing in League One, but again, it was just trying to commit my body to beef up and getting bigger and stronger to keep up with the pace.โ
In this environment, Doyle struggled to score with the same regularity as he had managed elsewhere.
The Irish striker finished his first season with five goals in 17 appearances. He was sent on loan to Championship rivals Preston the following campaign, but again, never quite hit the heights of his Chesterfield stint.
His progress at the Lilywhites was not helped by what he remembers as one of the worst moments of his career, where both himself and teammate Jermaine Beckford were sent off for fighting with one another.
โI remember my dad couldnโt sleep that night. He got up at 3am and I was on the sports section of CNN,โ he laughs.
โThe old Man United goalie Anders Lindegaard was our goalie, he was showing me the news in Denmark, and itโs me and Beckford.โ
Asked why it never quite happened for him at Championship level, Doyle says: โYou probably needed to give a bit more than just goals.
โMy hold-up play was never great. But in the Championship if my hold-up play wasnโt great and I gave the ball away, you potentially could concede because you get punished for mistakes easily.
โAnd I think me being a fox in the box probably wasnโt enough for the Championship.
โDonโt get me wrong. I played left wing for Preston and played loads of times in different positions not fully upfront.
โBut I think if someone was to commit to me in the Championship at the time, just let him be, put the ball into the box and heโll get you goals, I think I would have been able to get a good few.โ
Similarly, the dream of playing for Ireland eluded Doyle with plenty of competition in the squad for the attacking spots.
โTo get to the heights of being an international or anything like that, I probably just didnโt have enough at that stage.
โAnd at the time when I was playing up front and scoring goals, you have to remember, Kevin Doyle, Robbie Keane, Shane Long and Noel Hunt were still playing, I wasnโt at that level. Whereas if it was now, or maybe the last three or four years, and I was doing what I was doing at that time, I may have got a call-up.โ
Doyle generally got on much better in Leagues One and Two. Of those eight seasons in either division, he scored at least 10 goals in six and twice broke the 20-goal barrier. Moreover, the two exceptions were only half-seasons at Bolton and Portsmouth.
Even in what he describes as the worst time in his career, as part of a Bradford side that had three different managers during a single season and ended up finishing bottom of League One, he still managed a respectable tally of 10 goals amid this turbulent campaign.
โWhen the League One clubs then came back in for me and seeing what I had previously done, they knew the type of striker I was,โ he says.
โIโd worked my arse off and all that, but basically if you put balls back in the box, I was very handy at putting balls in the back of the net. So any club I signed for after that seemed to play a system that suited me.
โAnd then obviously, when the goals were going in, they knew if you can get this striker in, and play this type of way, we have a good chance of going up or whatever because this fella can score goals.
โThe last few years over there, I was that go-to fella, especially from League Two up to League One to get you a handful of goals.โ
Indeed, towards the latter end of his career, prolific seasons for Swindon and Bolton inspired successful League Two promotion bids two seasons on the bounce.
As productive as this spell was on the pitch, it was taking its toll away from it, with the constant moving from place to place and the long journeys to training becoming a routine.
โI think Danny my eldest lived in five houses before he was two,โ he recalls. โThat was when I was really on the move all the time.
โIt was just a mad period in my career where every window opened up and people were ringing: โWill you come here?โ
โWhen I signed for Preston, we moved to Liverpool and we settled there, so any club I signed for, I travelled from the base in Liverpool so my kids were born there. They came home with full-on Scouse accents but they are starting to shake them now.โ
The prospect of long-term stability was part of what motivated Doyleโs desire to return to Ireland and take those crucial tentative steps towards the second phase of his life.
As he sips on an Americano throughout our interview, Doyle comes across as a contented figure. Having once dreaded the thought of retirement, he now seems at ease with his new status as an ex-footballer.
โI donโt miss it but I havenโt been back to a match yet,โ he says. โIโve watched them on the telly. Iโve a feeling if I go into the stadium I might feel a little [itch to play].
โSo Iโve deliberately stayed away. I fully plan next year to be out at all the games every Friday as much as possible. But for now, Iโm staying away.
โIโll go to the cup final, bring the kids and that.โ
no Conway is the man. fast can tackle & safe hands under a high ball
@john fleming: shtop.
@john fleming: Ha ha ha
Heโs too dangerous a finisher to take off the wing. Iโd like to see Stockdale-Lowe-Larmour next season
@Rudiger McMonihan: Lowe is qualified?
@Rudiger McMonihan: that would be a ridiculous backline
@Rudiger McMonihan: oh Jesus Christ !!!!
@Bluepoolroad: after the world cup
I think itโs November 2020 before he qualifies
@Rudiger McMonihan: Keith Earls wonโt be pushed out that easily.
@Rudiger McMonihan: Jesus did earlโs steal your wife or something
@Padraic Burke: Earls isnโt half the player that Lowe is.
Earlโs is much older and in a years time it is unlikely that he will still be the best winger. If he is then fair play to him. I hope Iโm proven wrong!
@Baz Dunne: your right. Heโs twice the player.
@Anthony:
For Leinster the qualification of Jamison Gibson-Park at the end of 2019 will mean J Lowe should become a regular because that 2 into 3 problem will be gone. But it will not be till next year that he could qualifie (if he wants to go for a place in the Ireland setup)
A fine player but Earls is the man !!
@Baz Dunne: And youโre clearly not half the expert you think you are.
@Bluepoolroad: yes Lowe can play I. Next 6nations I think โฆ has to be in the mix as does Adam Byrne I think if he keeps progressing post the Kearney, Earls era
Is there anything to be said for Simon Zebo?
@southside: No
@southside: if he comes back then absolutely
@Rudiger McMonihan: Zebo shouldnโt have to come back to qualify. He is 1/2 French and has chosen to experience that culture. Should that restrict his eligibility?? NO
Bad example but Imagine telling Irish soccer players plying their trade in England you need to play in the league of Ireland.
Zebo record try scorer for Munster
Was on shortlist in his 1 season for Top 14 player of the year. Of course he should be considered.
@southside: yeah get lost Simon
@T Meister: yes it most certainly should restrict it. We need to protect our provincial game because at the moment itโs working. Look at how bad the French team are because they have no control over french club players
@T Meister: I canโt believe weโre STILL having the Zebo conversation.
@Anthony:
So should Sexton have been dropped too?
@The Great Unwashed:
Different times my friend and all gone over many many times .
@Anthony: FREEDOM of choice for ALL.
Best players who qualify for this country should be considered. Provinces should stand on their own merits encourage Irish players to stay but not the detriment of the National Side being able to choose The Best 15.
@Martin Quinn:
Not different times at all. The โruleโ applied to players before Sexton and after Sexton, so why didnโt it apply to Sexton himself?
You canโt have a policy and then choose to disregard it when itโs inconvenient โ either itโs the policy or it isnโt.
@The Great Unwashed: maybe you should change your name to the great uneducated, this was enforced because of sexton.
@Chris Mc:
What does that even mean? The policy was there long before Sexton moved to Racing, so why wasnโt it applied to him as it was applied to other players who moved overseas?
@The Great Unwashed: I know the reason as you certainly do by the question you asked and for THIS reply to be published this is all I can say.
No.
His a winger.
Stick to players playing in there natural position. Instead of fannying about.
@Paddy Waggon: played u20 at full back and pretty impressive at that
@Kevin Donnelly: why was he moved to the wing so .
@Paddy Waggon: To get game time in a position which is not as challenging for a young inexperienced player. He will be Ulsterโs 15 for years to come imo
Even though his defence has improved over the past 12 months, it remains the weakest part of his game. At 15 he could be exposed by all of the open ground as opposed to being able to use the touchline as an extra defender. It could improve for pro14 level but I donโt think he could manage international.
@Declan Snow: Itโs his defensive positioning and reads that have let him down, rather than his tackle technique. At 15 heโll only really be needed to shut someone down when they break the line and he has the speed to do it. Would really like to see him there.
The thoughts of a Stockdale, Lowe, Larmour back 3 going into the next world cup cycle is mouth watering!
Iโd prefer to see Larmour getting some serious game time back there!
He needs to be given a few games on the run
@Aaron Tynan: In what aspect(s) of his game is Jordan better than Jacob?
@Bluepoolroad: actually grounding the ball for one
@John Keenan: savage
@John Keenan: that was harsh now in fairness.
@Stephen Foster: funny tho
@Bluepoolroad:
Knowing when to pass.
I think everyone is forgetting about Addison. I think he will have a say in that back 3 over the next 4 โ 8 years.
Stockdale canโt / wonโt pass.
You need a 15 that can pass.
@Bungee Aky: so Rob Lyttle got the ball by telepathy on Friday night?
@Ian Frizzell: you said it
@Bungee Aky: Rob โStraightens the lineโ Kearney never saw a ball he couldnt run into the first chaser with
@Bungee Aky: Kearney is knowing for his passing rather than his running into contact ;-)
@Bungee Aky: also a dodgy defender
@Kevin Donnelly: In what alternate universe is that true?
I never feel confident that he will catch a high contested ball in game.
The question is, who will be fb come world cup
Henshaw is our best natural fullback, I hope Joe sticks with him in the warm ups.
@Rochelle: showed against england he has almost no positional sense to defend the chip over the top. If he isnt playing 15 for leinster (he wont be) its a non runner for Ire
@Rochelle: He is in his hoop
@Kazoochka: bovine excrement! He covered as well as anyone would have with that defensive set up. Even with the tweaks that followed RK with all his experience was caught several times v Italy. Give players that much time to look up and pick and choose their kicks and with nobody else dropping into the backfield the best 15 in the world would have struggled. England just out gunned us tactically and broke our defence down, I wouldnโt go pointing the finger at any one player.
@Kazoochka: both Earls and Stockdale made horrible calls in the game and expecting an full back to read those is a bit much.
Larmour is prob next in line, he still has a lot of learning to do in my opinion. There are a lot of times in games where his decision making with ball in hand gets him (team) in trouble. No doubting his ability but sometimes he should just take the direct line of contact and get go forward rather than trying to jink statically around guys and then get pushed back a few meters
Well itd be interesting. Hes a tall lad so fielding wouldnt be an issue. In terms of speed hes very quick as well. But is he too tqll that hes an easier target?
Worth a try at least.
Iโd much rather keep him on the wing. Itโs a pity Haley has taken the fullback position at Munster as I believe Conway is our best all rounded fullback in the country. While larmour and Addison have still to add to their game, I believe Conway has all the right attributes to make a top quality fullback at international level.
@Anthony O Connell: Conway has never really claimed the Munster 15 shirt and always seems to be injured when the internationals come around. Heโs no spring chicken either.
You shut up.
Iโm Eoin McLove.
I can do what I lie!