IT’S OVER two years since Michael Doyle retired as a footballer, but he still gets up very early every morning.
And by 6.30am, he is out the door for a “nice long run” to start the day.
“It’s just something that’s been ingrained in me since a young age that I’ve always enjoyed doing — being fit,” he tells The 42.
“As a player, in my early career probably one of the biggest assets was fitness and since I stopped playing, I’ve continued to look after myself.”
It’s almost 20 years since Doyle’s first and only Irish appearance — a 1-0 win over the Netherlands that was also Ireland’s most recent victory against the Dutch.
A defeat of Holland then seemed almost as improbable as it looks today, particularly when you consider the calibre of players lining out in Amsterdam for that pre-Euro 2004 friendly.
Edgar Davids, Clarence Seedorf, Rudd van Nistelrooy, Arjen Robben, Jaap Stam and Patrick Kluivert were included in the star-studded matchday squad.
Brian Kerr’s Ireland lined up with a midfield of Matt Holland, Alan Quinn and Andy Reid, with Graham Barrett, Robbie Keane and Clinton Morrison forming the attack.
A spectacular strike from Keane on the brink of half-time proved to be the match-winner, with Doyle helping to see out an impressive victory after replacing Andy Reid in the 88th minute.
“I was desperate to get an Ireland cap being involved in many squads up to that point,” he recalls. “It was a great experience, but considering it’s your only cap it’s a bit disappointing.
“I played in the Championship for [several] years and at that point, to have one cap, it just goes to show the quality of player we had.
“If you look at it now, I’m not saying how easy it is to get caps, but there are people playing League One football who have got a lot of caps.
“You look at the midfield players that you are competing with from Mark Kinsella, Roy Keane had come back at that stage, you’ve got Matt Holland, Stephen McPhail, Andy Reid, Steven Reid, Colin Healy, Graham Kavanagh, just quality players.”
Doyle had previously featured prominently for Ireland’s U21 side and did come close to adding to his senior tally, receiving positive feedback after catching the eye during a B international against Scotland in 2007, where he lined out in midfield alongside an uncapped youngster by the name of Glenn Whelan.
So while his time may have been relatively brief at international level, the same could not be said for his club career.
Doyle is currently 80th on the list of all-time highest appearances in English football with 669.
Only one Irishman, Man United legend Denis Irwin, is ahead of him with 682.
The Dublin-born midfielder actually ended his career having played 735 games, but the aforementioned list does not include fixtures from England’s fifth tier, the National League.
If that were the case, Doyle would be ahead of Irwin and just outside the top 30 overall and he would be even higher if the list discounted appearances in the Premier League, the one division in England Doyle never played.
“I obviously kept myself very fit,” he says. “And I think the word is in the job title, ‘professional footballer’. So I took it very seriously and got the most out of my career, and it was brilliant.
“I think I’m in the top five Football League appearances and things like that. Someone sent me that last year.
“So I’ve obviously played a lot of games and I’m really, really proud. I got the most out of my career and enjoyed it.”
Bolstering this record, however, was not Doyle’s biggest priority.
When he was part of a Notts County side that were relegated from League Two at the end of the 2018-19 season, he had offers to stay in the EFL.
However, the idea of leaving a club in peril did not sit right with him, even if meant forgetting about chasing that Irwin record.
“The ownership wasn’t looking great. There were only about 10 players there.
“Obviously, for my family, I was 40 minutes from the house. But at the same time, you knew if somebody took the club, it would do well again.
“So I stayed there and I made the right decision because it helped me. I played a lot of games in the National League and then went on to become assistant manager at the football club, so that was probably more important to me than the appearances.”
His extraordinary record was all the more remarkable when considering Doyle was a late starter in two senses.
Part of a Cherry Orchard side that won the treble at youth level, he went across the water at 17, which was considered old to be going away in those days.
He initially signed for Celtic but left at 22, during the Martin O’Neill era, without having made a single league appearance. His only first-team experience at that stage was in Denmark. He went over for a season-long loan to AGF Aarhus with fellow Bhoys youngster and “my best mate at the time,” the late Liam Miller.
Doyle impressed to the extent that he eventually earned a move the following year to Coventry City, who were playing their second season of Championship football, having previously appeared in all of the first nine Premier League seasons.
The Dubliner would spend seven campaigns with the Sky Blues in the Championship — a spell interrupted by a loan move to Leeds in which he helped the Yorkshire club gain promotion from League One.
As he grew older, he gradually dropped down the tiers, playing four seasons with Sheffield United in League One and a couple in League Two with Portsmouth and during a second stint at the Sky Blues.
While some players can fall out of love with the game, Doyle says football became more enjoyable as he got older.
“I improved as a player at the back end of my career,” he explains.
“I was a lot more of an integral part of teams, getting on the ball and things like that.
“Whereas probably when I was playing in the Championship for Coventry, we were fighting relegation battles most years.
“So it was a bit different and I felt when I got to my late 20s, early 30s, the game had changed. It got a bit more tactical, a lot of coaches were trying to play through the thirds and through the units whereas before in the Championship, it was a lot of big, aggressive teams.”
Doyle may never have reached the promised land of the Premier League, but he does have something few footballers from that era can boast — a 100% away record versus Manchester United.
“I played at Old Trafford twice against Man United and won twice with Coventry in the League Cup and then with Leeds United in the FA Cup,” he remembers.
“Back in the day, it was rare to go to Old Trafford and be able to get a win because, under Alex Ferguson, they were in their pomp for 20-odd years.”
It was far from the only career highlight. Doyle had experienced some near misses in the playoffs before finally triumphing in his second spell with Coventry in 2018.
“I played at Wembley four or five times until that point but never managed to win and then to eventually go there with Coventry as a captain and experience winning, it was absolutely amazing,” he recalls.
“Not everybody is going to be Roy Keane when they grow up, a top footballer who plays for the biggest club in England and collects trophies on a yearly basis. It’s just about going and making a career.
“When I grew up in the ’80s and ’90s it was a real [occasion] when you could see football. You can watch football on the telly every night now but growing up for me it was Saint and Greavsie on a Saturday morning and the build-up to an FA Cup final and you might get the odd league game on BBC and ITV.
“So the cup final was the one game that was guaranteed to be on every year and to kind of experience that in some sort of way, playing in a playoff final, was amazing.
“It’s like a lower-league footballer’s cup final. And we took a massive following with Coventry, 40,000 were there.”
Unusually for a League One club, Doyle’s Sheffield United also made it all the way to the FA Cup semi-final in 2014, losing an eight-goal thriller at Wembley 5-3 despite twice taking the lead against Premier League Hull.
But Coventry will be the club that Doyle retains the closest affinity with having made over 300 appearances for the Sky Blues in nine seasons.
While he left in 2019, he can take solace in the fact that he was a key part of a remarkable rejuvenation under Mark Robbins that saw them subsequently go to within a penalty shootout of a Premier League return last season.
“Going back the second time, the club was basically on its arse with the ownership and the fans. They had obviously taken them out of the city and gone to Northampton. They weren’t speaking to the local media.
“A lot had gone on and I just remember going back, having been promoted with Portsmouth as captain and it was very hard to leave Portsmouth but Coventry was where my family lived and I had a young family.
“So I went back to Coventry, they were desperate, they wanted me to go back and I kind of went back more for my family than myself.
“I met Mark Robbins and we had a good chat. We talked about trying to get promoted and him trying to change the culture at the club. There was a lot of negativity from the supporters, they had just been relegated from League One to League Two. So to go back and play a big part and I spoke to the media right away and things like that.
“Getting the fans involved and getting them back onside, we did an awful lot in the community to try and build that spirit again. And fortunately enough, that season was topped off with getting a playoff final win.
“And the club has never really looked back since, they’re on the crest of a wave the last five, six years.”
Just over four years after leaving, Doyle’s contribution in helping to resurrect the club was recognised as he was invited back to attend the Championship playoff final against Luton.
In a way, it felt as if the Irish star’s career had come full circle, returning once more to the team that gave him a chance in the first place.
“I still live in the area and when I go up, the people there treat me amazingly. They can’t do enough for me, even the manager and things like that, when they got to the playoff final, he wanted me to come up and see it, be around and that, but I had my own stuff sorted.
“You take real pride along with other players who are part of that journey, to see them doing well it’s absolutely great.”
Coaching is Doyle’s current preoccupation. Following stints as assistant manager with Notts County and Forest Green Rovers, since July, he has been back at Portsmouth, serving as a Professional Developmental Phase coach in the youth academy.
He certainly has the leadership qualities required for management, having captained virtually every club he played at.
“I think naturally a lot of people growing up in Ireland, it’s kind of the way we play. Probably our biggest trait is our tenacity and our commitment to everything that we do
“In sport, we’re very committed people. I played Gaelic and football all the way when I was younger and one of the biggest things I learned when I look back now was how important GAA was, I just loved everything about it.
“I loved playing it but when I look now to the last 10 years and you get a bit older, that’s the one thing I’d say you miss about home, having that GAA club, that community of everybody, this is where you’re from, and this is who you’re playing for. This is where you don’t leave. You don’t leave your clubs in Gaelic and go somewhere else.
“So I loved the commitment and loyalty that that brings, and I feel like a lot of Irish players without them really knowing, that’s probably one of our biggest traits, what the GAA puts into us for those that have been fortunate enough to play it. That kind of commitment to your local community and I feel a lot of Irish players have that captain gene in them because of what we’ve grown up and played in.”
His early years at Coventry were also key in this respect when Doyle was surrounded by experienced pros.
“Steve Staunton, Gary McAllister and Dennis Wise played for us. They were at the end of their careers and what an experience to be playing with them. Those three players were the best players every day in training.
“You knew how good they were watching Liverpool and Chelsea, but then to actually go and play with them [was special].
“That would have been in the Championship, but they were streets ahead of everybody. Just what they could do, they could put a football anywhere.”
Nowadays, it is Doyle who is in this position of passing on invaluable experience to the next generation of footballers.
“A lot of people I know that retired young, they found when they got to their early 30s, they were struggling to get clubs and it was quite tough because they’ve gone from being top players. But I just think as I look back and speak to them, their lifestyles caught up with them.
“They were playing National League, League Two, playing for near enough nothing. They’d gone from earning big money down to that. And they ended up retiring and people have a lot of regrets about that type of stuff. The game goes away from them and they lose the love of the sport.
“I’ve seen that with a few people that I know and come across. I feel very fortunate that I played until when I did.
“I looked after myself and realised at a point in my early-to-mid-20s that I couldn’t keep doing what I was doing. I was young and you would go out every Saturday and the odd time in the week and all of a sudden, it was like: ‘I can’t do that anymore.’ I just cut it out and for the next 15 years of my career, I lived like a monk. And you’ve got to live it if you want to enjoy it. It comes with a lot of sacrifice.”
McAllister, who like Doyle, finished playing at the age of 40, was a vital influence in this respect during the Irishman’s early days at Coventry.
“The big turning point for me when I went to Coventry was my first pre-season. [Gary] was a very fit man. He looked after himself and he was 40 then. It always stuck with me: ‘Bloody hell.’
“I always remember leaving a mark on him because I was always really into my fitness. That first pre-season, he was the manager.
“He obviously did every session and I kind of put down a marker for myself that pre-season. I won bloody everything running-wise. And back then, pre-season was running every day and I was flying ahead.
“I always remember him, having a few words, talking to me: ‘Bloody hell, you’re like a marathon runner.’ Even though I was only young, it gave me massive confidence. I obviously knew I’d left a mark with him as well because he was very fit. He wasn’t far behind me at that stage.”
