‘The medals are still mine but they mean more to others' – Shamrock Rovers ace Aaron Greene reflects on career milestone
AARON GREENE knows what he has achieved but is not one for keeping mementos.
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Aaron Greene of Shamrock Roveres was presented with a commemorative jersey to mark his recent achievement of scoring 100 League of Ireland goals by manager Stephen Bradley
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Aaron Greene also spoke about why he's given away nearly all his medals
It is an achievement not to be sniffed at - only 42 other players have done it in the
But Greene, 35, may not keep it. He knows what he has done, and has given away most of his medals in the past.
He explained: 'Of my medals I only have one. The only medal my wife made me keep was the fourth of the four-in-a-row.
'I've given my dad one, I've given one of my friends who lost his dad the week before we won the league one.
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'I've given one of my brother's friends who buried his son at 18-month-old one.
"I'm not doing this in a big-headed way; medals are brilliant and you can take them, but there was another Rovers fan…I gave him a medal, he passed away and it got put in his coffin.
'It's not about…the medal are still going to be mine, people can't say I haven't won them, but I've only got one and that's all I have in my house. It's framed with my four-in-a-row jersey.
'I haven't done it out of… it's for people that it probably means a little more to them.
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'You can't take it away from me, I still won them, but other people have them and I think they mean a little more to those people. That's really it.'
He knew his landmark goal was coming up as his father John and club statistician Karl Reilly had let him know when he was 99.
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His dad also keeps a scrapbook and was in Turner's Cross last Friday hoping to see it, before it came on Monday when he volleyed home a Graham Burke pass against Sligo.
Greene's first came in 2009 against Derry City and Rovers' fans still remind him his goal for Galway United against them that year ended their title hopes.
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But he is proud of it all and that, at 35, he continues to show the teenagers how it is done, as do fellow evergreen strikers like Rory Gaffney at Rovers and Padraig Amond at Waterford.
He said: 'I've been very lucky to share dressing rooms with a lot of really good senior players that have really helped me.
'And I try to take little bits of that to try to help the other boys that we have in our team. That's part of life.
'People come, make connections. I had the saying, you don't make friends in football. I've stayed in contact with a lot of people who I've had throughout my career.
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'Even at my wedding, the majority of people who were there were footballers. I've a lot of friends in football.
'Me, Rory and Johnny (Kenny), I know Johnny is at Celtic now but we are still very close.
'What Rory put his body through, the operations last year, to come back and play is incredible. There is a lot left in the old boys. Don't write us off yet!
'Even when we do our running, if the young boys don't stay with us, trust me, we let them know. It is a younger league, but the old boys still have a bit to go.
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'You see Podge (Amond) at Waterford, we still have a bit to go. If you just flood it with younger boys, they are not going to learn.
'It's brilliant, we have a good relationship with our senior players and the young lads. I think we implement that well.'
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