{"id":19428,"date":"2021-01-26T09:15:03","date_gmt":"2021-01-26T13:15:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/irishexaminerusa.com\/wp\/?p=19428"},"modified":"2021-01-26T11:16:32","modified_gmt":"2021-01-26T15:16:32","slug":"former-wales-captain-ashley-williams-announces-retirement","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/irishexaminerusa.com\/wp\/?p=19428","title":{"rendered":"Former Wales Captain Ashley Williams Announces Retirement"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" src=\"http:\/\/irishexaminerusa.com\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/2.38386986.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"525\" height=\"360\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-19429\" srcset=\"https:\/\/irishexaminerusa.com\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/2.38386986.jpg 525w, https:\/\/irishexaminerusa.com\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/2.38386986-300x206.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 525px) 100vw, 525px\" \/>Former Wales captain Ashley Williams, who led his country to the semi-finals of Euro 2016, has announced his retirement.<\/p>\n<p>The 36-year-old defender made more than 300 appearances for Swansea, was an ever-present as the club reached the Premier League for the first time in 2011, and also played for Everton, Stoke and most recently Bristol City.<\/p>\n<p>Williams appeared 86 times for Wales and scored two goals, including the equalizer in the memorable 3-1 win over Belgium in the European Championship quarter-final in France.<\/p>\n<p>Williams said in a statement on Instagram: \u201cAfter consideration of recent offers to continue playing, I would like to announce my retirement as a professional footballer.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt has been an honor to play 741 games across all levels of the English football leagues and to represent some incredible teams.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt has been an unbelievable journey and one I will look back on with my family and be immensely proud of. Starting from non-league to playing at the highest level in the Premier League, as well as representing my country on 86 occasions, was beyond my wildest dreams.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cCaptaining Wales in a semi-final (of the) European Championships in 2016 was my greatest achievement and something I will never forget.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cFootball has taught me so much both on and off the field and I will take this with me into the next chapter. I look forward to still being involved in the game in the future.\u201d<\/p>\n<div class=\"sharedaddy sd-sharing-enabled\"><div class=\"robots-nocontent sd-block sd-social sd-social-icon sd-sharing\"><h3 class=\"sd-title\">Share this:<\/h3><div class=\"sd-content\"><ul><li class=\"share-facebook\"><a rel=\"nofollow\" data-shared=\"sharing-facebook-19428\" class=\"share-facebook sd-button share-icon no-text\" href=\"https:\/\/irishexaminerusa.com\/wp\/?p=19428&amp;share=facebook\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to share on Facebook\"><span><\/span><span class=\"sharing-screen-reader-text\">Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-twitter\"><a rel=\"nofollow\" data-shared=\"sharing-twitter-19428\" class=\"share-twitter sd-button share-icon no-text\" href=\"https:\/\/irishexaminerusa.com\/wp\/?p=19428&amp;share=twitter\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to share on Twitter\"><span><\/span><span class=\"sharing-screen-reader-text\">Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-google-plus-1\"><a rel=\"nofollow\" data-shared=\"sharing-google-19428\" class=\"share-google-plus-1 sd-button share-icon no-text\" href=\"https:\/\/irishexaminerusa.com\/wp\/?p=19428&amp;share=google-plus-1\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to share on Google+\"><span><\/span><span class=\"sharing-screen-reader-text\">Click to share on Google+ (Opens in new window)<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-print\"><a rel=\"nofollow\" data-shared=\"\" class=\"share-print sd-button share-icon no-text\" href=\"https:\/\/irishexaminerusa.com\/wp\/?p=19428\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to print\"><span><\/span><span class=\"sharing-screen-reader-text\">Click to print (Opens in new window)<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-end\"><\/li><\/ul><\/div><\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Former Wales captain Ashley Williams, who led his country to the semi-finals of Euro 2016, has announced his retirement. The 36-year-old defender made more than 300 appearances for Swansea, was an ever-present as the club reached the Premier League for&#8230;<\/p>\n<div class=\"sharedaddy sd-sharing-enabled\"><div class=\"robots-nocontent sd-block sd-social sd-social-icon sd-sharing\"><h3 class=\"sd-title\">Share this:<\/h3><div class=\"sd-content\"><ul><li class=\"share-facebook\"><a rel=\"nofollow\" data-shared=\"sharing-facebook-19428\" class=\"share-facebook sd-button share-icon no-text\" href=\"https:\/\/irishexaminerusa.com\/wp\/?p=19428&amp;share=facebook\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to share on Facebook\"><span><\/span><span class=\"sharing-screen-reader-text\">Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-twitter\"><a rel=\"nofollow\" data-shared=\"sharing-twitter-19428\" class=\"share-twitter sd-button share-icon no-text\" href=\"https:\/\/irishexaminerusa.com\/wp\/?p=19428&amp;share=twitter\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to share on Twitter\"><span><\/span><span class=\"sharing-screen-reader-text\">Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-google-plus-1\"><a rel=\"nofollow\" data-shared=\"sharing-google-19428\" class=\"share-google-plus-1 sd-button share-icon no-text\" href=\"https:\/\/irishexaminerusa.com\/wp\/?p=19428&amp;share=google-plus-1\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to share on Google+\"><span><\/span><span class=\"sharing-screen-reader-text\">Click to share on Google+ (Opens in new window)<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-print\"><a rel=\"nofollow\" data-shared=\"\" class=\"share-print sd-button share-icon no-text\" href=\"https:\/\/irishexaminerusa.com\/wp\/?p=19428\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to print\"><span><\/span><span class=\"sharing-screen-reader-text\">Click to print (Opens in new window)<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-end\"><\/li><\/ul><\/div><\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":19429,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[11,4],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/irishexaminerusa.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19428"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/irishexaminerusa.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/irishexaminerusa.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/irishexaminerusa.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/irishexaminerusa.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=19428"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/irishexaminerusa.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19428\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19430,"href":"https:\/\/irishexaminerusa.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19428\/revisions\/19430"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/irishexaminerusa.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/19429"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/irishexaminerusa.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=19428"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/irishexaminerusa.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=19428"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/irishexaminerusa.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=19428"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}