Givens: it was my decision to quit

DON GIVENS insists it was his decision to step down as Ireland U21 manager, although he concedes that pressure was building on him in the wake of the recent home defeat to Armenia which capped a dismal run of results for his charges.

“It was my decision,” he said, speaking from his home in England last night. “I know that things were building anyway a little bit, there’s no getting away from that, but it was my decision. I spoke to the association and between us we came up with a change of role.

“I feel a little bit of disappointment in some ways, in particular with the last couple of performances. I know that before that we hadn’t won games but I felt we had deserved to win most of them. But the two performances against Armenia were very disappointing and probably prompted me to look at things and see that maybe the time was right to change the role.”