The Footie Fool

Will we see Jim Brennan training in national colours again?

Found this info poking around Jim Brennan’s spanky new website this morning.  Now, maybe I missed the official announcements, but I thought the problem Jim had with the team was Dale Mitchell and that once he was gone we would see Jimmy return to the fold. But there can be no doubt with the language on the site that Jim Brennan has retired from international competition. Note the final paragraph on his Team Canada page:

Now retired from Team Canada, Brennan looks back proudly on his career playing for his nation.

And then check out the language used to describe the WCQ in Mexico last fall. You’ll have to dig around the page to find the source as his new website is designed in such a way that I cannot link directly to the quote.

Jimmy’s last start and final cap for Canada came in the southern Mexican city of Tuxtla Gutierrez.

I’d say that is pretty definitive language. But if I recall correctly last fall I thought Brennan’s position was that he had not shut the door on Canada. Here is what Brennan said at the time.

“I spoke to officials here at Toronto FC, my family and friends, and decided that it was best that I step down from the national team while the current manager is in place,” Brennan confirmed to reporters on Tuesday.

“That’s not to say I won’t play for Canada again, it’s just that there’s a lot going on that I don’t agree with, I don’t see eye to eye on a lot of things.”

I would have thought that with Mitchell gone there may have been a place for Jim in the team and (wrongly) assumed he would be called for the Gold Cup.

I’m not surprised if he really has hung up the kit for the nats. There was a lot of bad blood flowing last fall, much of it swirling around Jim. Perhaps there was enough spilled that he finally decided to wash his hands  of the whole MNT mess.

Or perhaps it is just time and he is following TFC teamate Carl Robinson, who announced his retirement from the Welsh national team earlier this week.

I’m not sure of all the machinations going on here (maybe someone who is more of a reporter type might be able to dig up some more definitive news about Brennan’s staus. Joe? Duane?  Ben?)  But it looks to me like Jim Brennan has retired from Canada. And we really didn’t have a chance to say goodbye.

Photo credit From Flickr by 604Plonker. Used under Creative Commons license.