Ezequiel Garay announced his retirement from professional football today.
The player had been without a club since leaving us last year. He revealed that he had been suffering with a long term injury since 2018 and had had offers from other clubs since leaving us, but felt that it would have been dishonest to accept them since the injury situation would have meant he would only have been available for one game out of every three.
Valencia first attempted to buy Garay in summer 2015 as Otamendi's replacement. It's not clear why the deal didn't happen then and we got Abdennour instead, who turned out to be a disaster.
With the hapless Abdennour shipped out on loans we got Garay the following year and his best years followed with the arrival of Marcelino in 2017 as he formed a solid backline with Paulista. Ultimately, his decision to speak out strongly against the sacking of Marcelino sealed his fate. Given Lim's vindictiveness, he would have been released last year anyway. A serious injury suffered against Celta in the 43rd minute on 1 February 2020 proved to be the end of his career. In total he played 114 games for us over four seasons, scoring 6 goals.
It's unclear why no one picked him up last season. He was still highly rated enough to be signed on a contract that would include a significant "pay as you play" element. Ultimately it wasn't to be and I'm sure all of us will wish him well in his retirement.