Paul Fennessy

IN FOOTBALL, people are quick to praise obvious brilliance.

Superstars like Erling Haaland and Kevin De Bruyne will always attract their fair share of accolades.

Yet below this level, thousands of hard-working pros turn up and train to the best of their ability every day for years with minimal fuss.

Joe Murphy epitomises the latter group.

The goalkeeper will be 43 years old in August. 

Earlier this month, it was announced he would be extending his playing career after signing a new one-year contract with Tranmere Rovers.

It is not something Murphy would have envisaged when he originally moved across the water as a 15-year-old with three other lads from Stella Maris, all of whom were back home within about two years.

He admits now he “probably wasn’t” a Premier League player.

“But I always feel and I still feel now, I can play in the Premier League because that’s just my mentality — I always want to have high standards,” he tells The 42.

By most people’s standards, he has had an excellent career. He was capped twice for Ireland at senior level, nearly 10 years apart, once under Brian Kerr and then during the Giovanni Trapattoni era.

He also had a great career at underage level, beating the likes of John O’Shea and Andy Reid to the U21 Player of the Year award in 2002, while he was a key figure for the Brian Kerr-managed Irish side that won the U16 European Championships in 1998.

His time in the Premier League was brief but memorable — of the two games he played, the first saw him save a Michael Owen penalty with his first touch at Anfield.

The boyhood Liverpool fan wasn’t even meant to be on the bench that day, but the substitute goalkeeper Brian Jensen was ill, so he came on in the 35th minute after regular number one Russell Hoult was sent off.

He was even heavily linked with Liverpool at one point, with manager Gerard Houllier personally confirming his interest in Murphy, though the move never materialised.

Almost a quarter of a century has passed since he made his league debut. An 18-year-old Murphy was thrown in the deep end by then-Tranmere boss and Ireland legend John Aldridge.

His first game was in the Championship, or First Division as it was then known, for a “full house” at Tranmere against a Manchester City side featuring the likes of Paul Dickov, Ian Bishop, Nicky Weaver and ex-Ireland international Mark Kennedy.

At the time, you’d have got long odds predicting that 25 years later, Murphy would still be playing for Tranmere while Man City would be the reigning champions of England and Europe.

What turned out to be a very stable career began in rollercoaster fashion.

Earlier in the week, the youngster had made his senior debut in a 2-0 League Cup win over Oxford United in which he saved a penalty from namesake Matt Murphy.

Days later, Murphy unfortunately conceded a penalty versus City, though Tranmere still managed a creditable 1-1 draw against the side that would soon be promoted to the Premier League. Another Irishman, Alan Mahon, scored a late equaliser, much to Murphy’s relief.

He then missed a significant portion of the season through injury but returned just in time for the League Cup final at Wembley.

Shay Given watches as Joe Murphy makes a save during Ireland training in 2009. James Crombie / INPHO James Crombie / INPHO / INPHO

Murphy and his teammates suffered late heartbreak in his 16th game as a professional footballer.

They were narrowly beaten 2-1 by a Matt Elliot-inspired, Martin O’Neill-managed Leicester City.

“I broke my collarbone in the quarter-finals,” he recalls. “So I made my debut in October and then the final was February, so I returned a week before the cup final, played one game and then played in the final.”

Aside from the brief Premier League stint, Murphy has spent most of his career alternating between the Championship and League One.

In 2018, aged 37, he finally dropped to League Two with Bury.

“And actually, that year we won League Two and then unfortunately Bury was no longer [in the English Football League] after that,” Murphy adds.

Murphy’s new deal sees him continue a dual position he began two years ago. The Dubliner is a goalkeeper coach as well as a player.

He is currently back-up to regular number one Luke McGee, but for a footballer in his 40s, Murphy has seen plenty of game time since returning to the club in 2020, making 45 appearances including six this season.

In February 2023, the Irishman became the oldest player in Tranmere’s history, delivering a man-of-the-match performance in their 1-0 victory over Stevenage.

He is one of the oldest active footballers in the world and is near the top of the list of Irish male players in terms of appearances in English football with 579 — there are just 13 individuals ahead of him.

The coaching aspect of his role has come naturally enough and in a way, it is just an extension of what Murphy has been doing his entire career, shouting at defenders and warning them not to let their concentration slip.

“Since Nigel [Adkins] has come in, he’s given me that little bit more freedom to be involved in all the coaching, not just the goalkeeping but I’m involved with the defensive side of stuff and things like that,” Murphy says.

“I’m not saying I’ve no other attributes, but I was always a big talker, I always thought a goalkeeper doesn’t want to be busy.

“So if you can stop the people in front of you, or you can help the people in front of you to stop the other team, it means you’re doing less.

“[Talking through games] is also helpful for yourself, because it keeps you in the game. When I was younger, my concentration wasn’t great. So I found that if I talked more I would be more involved and concentrated.”

Murphy is regularly reminded of his age — eight of the starting XI during that landmark 2023 game were not even born when he made his senior debut in 1999.

Yet the ex-Ireland international says he feels “probably better now” compared to 10 or 15 years ago.

Joe Murphy (l) discusses tactics with Nigel Adkins, the manager of Tranmere Rovers. Alamy Stock Photo Alamy Stock Photo

He credits his longevity to a conscious decision in his early 30s to “look after myself a bit more in regards to what I do in the offseason, what I do throughout the season, just to maintain fitness”.

He continues: “Maybe through the offseason when I was younger, I switched off and didn’t do as much as I do now.

“Whereas when we finish now, in a week, I’ll just continue to keep my body strong and work hard, so I just roll into next season, ready to go.

“And I’ve done that for the last 10 or so years. And it’s obviously been the right decision if I still feel good physically and mentally. I’ve been lucky with injuries, I suppose, as well.

“It’s difficult sometimes because people look at your age and automatically count you out. And that’s just the way it is, that’s just the way football is, and I’ve gone well past what people would expect a footballer to do.

“But if you still feel sharp and good enough to compete, you just keep going.”

And is there anything specific he is doing now that he would have neglected 10-15 years ago?

“They tell you to let the body rest for a couple of weeks, shut down and let everything recover. I don’t do that. I keep going. I’ll do my weights programme, I’ll do my CV [cardiovascular] sessions. 

“I’ve got a young family, and we’ll go on a couple of holidays, and I’ll enjoy myself and go back to Ireland and see the [relatives].

“But I’m always ticking over and it’s something that I enjoy and I will do it even when I retire.

“Whether it’s the right thing to do, some people are different. They might need to shut down and take a break because their body needs to recover.

“But I’ve found that it’s worked for me over the years where I keep ticking over and trying to stay as fit as possible.

“And football has changed, gone are the days where people have six, or seven weeks off in the offseason. You have to come back in as good nick as when you left, that’s just where football has gone now.”

Murphy has now spent well over half his life as a professional athlete. “It’s all I know,” the veteran goalkeeper says, and he is unsure what the next chapter will bring.

He is still passionate about the football industry. However, the toll of constant travelling and the intensity and uncertainty of the coaching industry can be drawbacks for a family man with three kids, so he could just as easily be in or out of it within the next decade.

“What am I going to do for the rest of my life? ‘I don’t know,’ is the honest answer.”