Shane Curran announced his retirement on Off The Ball this afternoon. The 43 year old St. Brigid's goalkeeper called it a day after a career that spanned more than two decades.
He told Off The Ball that last week's loss to Ballintubber in the Connacht club semi-final marked the end.
'I've always said the game gives you up rather than you give the game up... I've reached the stage where it has. I've taken my final bow from last weekend. People always say 'well, at 43 or 44, you're hardly going to go one more year' and the answer to that is that I won't'.
He insisted he wouldn't be dropping down to Junior B.
In the course of a colourful and varied career, Curran won an All-Ireland club title with St. Brigid's in 2013 and one Connacht championship medal with Roscommon back in 2001. He was Roscommon's first choice goalkeeper for most of the noughties.
A League of Ireland stalwart as well, he played for Athlone Town between 1991 and 2002, earning the club's player of the year award in 1994-95.
Curran became iconic for both his exuberance in post-match interviews and his adventurous Rene Higuita style sallies up the pitch, one of the most famous coming in last year's Connacht club final against Castlebar Mitchels. A pioneer in the field of scoring goalkeepers, back in 2004, he scored 1-1 in a qualifier in Markiewicz Park to beat Sligo in extra-time.
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