English goalkeeper Ben Foster has announced his retirement from football at the age of 39. Over the course of his career, he played for Manchester United, Watford and West Bromwich Albion. He also earned eight caps for the English national team.
The player was offered a contract by Newcastle United to become their second choice goalkeeper for the season, after the injury to Karl Darlow. However, he declined their offer in favour of staying with his family in the Midlands.
Ben Foster announces retirement decision on podcast
“Deep down I didn’t want to do it [turn down Newcastle],” Ben Foster told his podcast, The Cycling GK.
“It sounds mad and it’s such a hard thing to explain because there’ll be millions of people up and down the country that will say ‘you’ve just been offered a contract, a really good contract, by the richest team in the world to go and be second-choice goalkeeper and be part of something’.
“But I just didn’t want to do it, I had this deep feeling, and the wrench of it was that I’d have to move away from home, that would kill me.
“If I’m in an apartment in Newcastle by myself, away from my family, I don’t think people can understand. That’s hard to do, especially at the age I am and with everything else I’ve got going on.
“I know for a fact if I’d have gone there I’d have had an amazing time, the lads would have been absolutely brilliant and I’d have buzzed off the stadium, the fans, all that kind of stuff, but the overriding sinking feeling was ‘I don’t want to do this.’
