After a summer spent on trial at Loftus Road former League of Ireland Player of the Year Brian Murphy has signed a two year deal with Rangers.
Ipswich Town have a bit of a history with these Irish lads who fall into football after initially preferring Gaelic Games. Shane Supple, another goalkeeper, seemed to have a tremendous future ahead of him when he broke onto the scene at Portman Road after a youth spent playing Gaelic Football. Under the management of first Jim Magilton and then Roy Keane Supple became frustrated with a lack of games and loan spells in the back of beyond – Falkirk and Oldham . In 2009, aged just 22, Supple announced he was retiring from the game having "fallen out of love" with it and returned to his homeland to play Gaelic Football again.
That left Ipswich requiring a new goalkeeper and in Brian Murphy they found a similar character playing in the Irish league for Bohemians. He'd spent his formative years playing Hurling, Gaelic Football and Rugby Snoozion where he developed a prodigious drop kick that we may see a bit of now he has signed a two year deal at Loftus Road.
Nevertheless he was good enough to earn a place in Man City 's famed academy and served as understudy to David Seaman and Nicky Weaver while at Eastlands. He spent four seasons there, playing once in two loan spells at Oldham and Peterborough . He was allowed to join Swansea permanently in 2003 and started the 03/04 season as first choice before being usurped by Willy Gueret after 13 starts.
In 2006 he moved home to join Bohemians, keeping 19 clean sheets in 29 league games in the 2007 season and being named as the division's Goalkeeper of the Year by Irish football writers. In 2008, after turning down the chance to join Bristol City , he retained the award after 20 clean sheets in 33 appearances. He became the first ever goalkeeper to win the League of Ireland Player of the Year award that season as well, and went on to play in the UEFA Cup for Bohemians in 2009.
After winning the League of Ireland title two years in a row Murphy then moved to Ipswich . He enjoyed a decent run of games after a bad knee injury in the second half of the 2009/10 season but spent the majority of last season serving as second choice to Marton Fulop and rejected a new contract to pursue regular first team football elsewhere.
"You need three senior keepers for the Premier League and we've got that now," said QPR manager Neil Warnock. He is a very capable understudy to Paddy; him and Radek will offer great competition for the coming season." -Neil Warnock
"I am here to work hard, and anything extra will be a bonus," he stated. "I want to be in that 18-man squad every week, but I know every player here wants the same thing. It is going to be a massive season for the club and one that I am looking forward to being a part of." -Brian Murphy
Of all the QPR transfer activity taking place this summer, successful purchases and failed attempts alike, the strangest one for me has been this pursuit of Brian Murphy. With the best will in the world it's difficult to describe him as anything other than a steady goalkeeper and it's probably the one position that, had you asked QPR fans for their strengthening priorities back in May, not a single supporter would have mentioned.
At Ipswich Murphy was quickly assessed as not being good enough for the number one spot by Roy Keane, who usually selects Irishmen for his team automatically regardless of ability, and went out and got Marton Fulop to replace him. Keane's replacement Paul Jewell released Murphy while bringing in Fulham's David Stockdale on loan. At QPR Neil Warnock has been consistently glowing in his praise of Paddy Kenny who he says he would not swap for any other goalkeeper in the Premiership. Kenny, of course, is QPR's reigning Player and Players' Player of the Year.
So Murphy clearly isn't coming here as first choice, and given Radek Cerny's presence as number two there is some debate whether he's coming here as the immediate back up in case Paddy has his eyebrow bitten off or gets at the Buttercup Syrup again. When he refused a reduced terms new deal at Portman Road he said he wanted to go and play first team football somewhere so to willingly walk into another two years as, at best, first reserve seems odd.
It maybe that Murphy is playing some sort of long game. At 28 he's not that old for a goalkeeper and Paddy Kenny and Radek Cerny are both older. Maybe he thinks that after two years of biding his time he'll usurp them both as first choice. Maybe Cerny, who has rarely inspired confidence during his time at the club, is being eased off into a coaching role, or full time job as Adel Taarabt's taxi driver.
There are a lot of ifs, buts and maybes in this article because I'm a bit perplexed about the whole thing to be honest. He wanted first team football that we can't offer him, we have a very tight budget to support three senior goalkeepers when we already have a very promising youth team stopper, and by all reasoned logic goalkeeper is the position we're strongest in.
It will be interesting to see what role, if any, Murphy plays during his time with us and where this leaves Elvijs Putnins our 19-year-old Latvian who has always impressed for youth and reserve sides but is now apparently not good enough to even by third choice. Strange all round.