Bentley Announces Retirement

Former England international David Bentley has stated that he is retiring from football at the age of 29. Bentley, who has seven England caps to his name, was last seen on the books of Spurs almost a year ago. He has been on the free transfer market for the last 12 months but he has failed to find a new club. This coupled with his lack of love for the game has led to the retirement. Bentley did not suffer any major injury problems during his career. This comes as a shock to many given that Bentley was once spoken of as the next David Beckham.

He moved to Tottenham in 2008 for £ 15 million, but his career went downhill immediately after joining the North London outfit. After failing to establish himself in the tournament first-team, he moved to several clubs like Birmingham and West Ham on loan deal from the club. He has made just over 250 matches in his career, but the last few years have been very difficult for him. Bentley came through the ranks at Arsenal before moving onto Blackburn where he made his name. He moved to Blackburn in 2006 and played for them in more than 100 matches before coming to North London.

“I’ve given up football. It’s over a year since I played my last game and I’ve taken the decision to take my life in a different direction. I felt like it was time to call it a day. I’ve just had little baby twins, three months old, and I’ve got a little four-year-old and I want to focus on that. My love for the game went a little bit and I didn’t want to carry on just for the fact of paying me money. It’s not really ever been an option for me to do that. I’m involved in a restaurant in Spain and we’re bringing it to the UK, so there is a lot of work there,” said Bentley.