Fordyce relishing opportunity to return to football
IT’S been over a year since Daryl Fordyce played competitive football.
So when the opportunity to sign for Sligo Rovers and return to full-time football cropped up, he jumped at the chance.
He’s familiar with the League of Ireland being from Belfast, and having played for both Glentoran and Linfield, so it’s not such a step into the unknown.
“Yeah I’m familiar enough, when I was at Glentoran we had the Setanta Cup, we managed to get to the final against Cork so I’d know of the league for sure.”
He left Belfast in 2013 and joined Edmonton in Canada, and later Cincinnati before returning to Edmonton, when in 2017 things went awry.
“The club folded in November 2017, three days later my wife said she was pregnant. She’s a good job in Canada so it was best for her to stay until May until she got her maternity.
“The plan was that she would get her maternity, I had come back to Belfast to start my coaching badges, I was just signing for a team in Scotland, and then go back to Canada, get her and move back to the UK.
“While I was doing my coaching badges she FaceTimed me and said she was in hospotal, the doctor said she had some medical condition, she couldn’t fly because she could get a blood clot. I had to go back to Canada until the baby was born.
“The baby was born in August, it took nearly eight weeks to get his passport and as soon as we got that we packed our bags and flew back to Belfast to see family.”
He’s managed to keep himself fit during that time, but he now cannot wait to get started.
“I haven’t played competitively in over a year but I’ve managed to keep myself fit. I’ve been eating properly. It has been tough. I’ve been training by myself and keep- ing myself ready so that when I got a team all they had to do was tune me up and get me ready.
“Last year was the toughest, best year of my life. Dealing with a baby, my wife didn’t have a good time in hospital, plus trying to train by myself. It was tough. I got on with it. I couldn’t sit down every day and do nothing.”
Having featured in the pre-season friendly against Athlone, Fordcye impressed and Buckley signed him up.
In Saturday’s friendly against Longford, Fordyce was again the stand out.
“I was in Belfast, the plan was to go back to Cnaada, they’re starting their own professional league.
“There was an agent in Belfast who contacted me and said there might be something in Southern Ireland for me. Then he contacted me again and said ‘what about Sligo?’ and I said ‘keep me updated’ and he told me they wanted me to come down and play a game. I came down last week and played a game and the manager obviously thought I was good enough to be signed.”
He is versatile and is willing to play wherever he is needed.
“I’d probably play in the attacking midfield, whether it’s as an 8 or a 10, it’s one of those two. I’m very versatile. I’ve played as a 9 before, I filled in as a left midfield before.
“No pressure. The older you get you deal with pressure a bit better, and help younger players through games. If you don’t feel pressure why would you even play. You want to feel pressure.”
With only days left until the season starts, he is raring to go.
“I can’t wait. Last week against Athlone it felt good just to tackle someone competitively, you can’t really tackle in training. Fingers crossed I hit the ground running and the team hit the ground running. I just want to do the best I can for the team. The older you get you seem to sacrifice yourself more for the team’s benefit because you see things a bit more.”