James McClean’s homecoming has not gone the way he wanted. He returned to his hometown club Derry City in January after leaving Wrexham, but he says he is still trying to stay optimistic after a comeback that has not met expectations.

He has not played 90 minutes since March, and Derry City have only five wins in 21 matches. That is the backdrop to McClean’s own assessment of the move, which he now describes as more difficult than the version of it people probably imagined from the outside.

Why McClean says the reality has been different

A couple of months ago, McClean said, he did not know if he would be back on a football pitch. Speaking to BBC, he said: "A couple of months ago, to be honest with you, I didn't know if I would be back on a football pitch."

He added that the picture built up by phone conversations did not match what he found when he came home. "You have a lot of conversations on the phone, and then you come home and quickly realise that what you hear on the phone is not what you see in reality," he said.

That is a fair description of a return that has been slowed by injury and limited minutes, with Derry City also struggling for consistency. They are sixth in the table and 15 points off leaders Shamrock Rovers.

McClean did not go into detail about every issue behind the difficult spell. "There are a lot of factors that have contributed to that. I'm going to leave them for another day," he said.

The most telling part is probably the simplest one: this was supposed to feel like a clean ending to a long career arc, but it has instead become a stop-start adjustment. McClean is back where he started, but his last 90 minutes came in March and the club around him has not provided the platform he would have hoped for.

If there is a positive here, it is that McClean is still speaking like someone who wants the move to work. Right now, though, the facts are blunt. The comeback has been hard, Derry City have only five wins in 21, and there is no sign yet that the hard part is over.

Compiled by the ClutchBrief Desk with AI assistance, cross-checked against 1 outlet. How we work →